Complete mitochondrial genome of a German Shepherd (Canis lupus familiaris breed German Shepherd) provides insights into genome-wide sequence variations.

In this work, we report the complete mitochondrial genome sequence of a German shepherd. The total length of the mitogenome was 16,727 bp. It contained the typical structure of 13 protein-coding genes, 2 ribosomal RNA genes, 22 transfer RNA genes and a non-coding control region (D-loop region). The arrangement of these genes was the same as that found in other dogs. All the protein initial codons were ATG, except for ND2, ND3 and ND5 starting with ATA. Sequence comparison indicates that D-loop region harbors most sequence variations.