Impacts

South Africa’s inshore Bryde’s whale is something of a mystery. Elusive, hard to study, and found year-round along the South African coastline, these whales are unlike the migratory humpbacks and southern right whales that pass through our waters. In fact, they may be more unique than we ever realised.

Dominique Paynee, a PhD student at the University of Pretoria, is working with the Mammal Research Institute’s Whale Unit and the Department of Genetics to uncover the population dynamics of these elusive animals, and genomics is central to the mission.

Her study focuses on two key goals:

1. Understanding the viability of the South African Bryde’s whale population, through estimates of effective population size and adaptive genetic diversity.

2. Determining whether this population is genetically connected to other Bryde’s whale populations around the world, or whether it may in fact be a distinct subspecies or even species.

To do this, Dominique and her collaborators are collecting tiny skin samples (biopsies) from free-ranging whales using hollow-tipped darts. From this, they extract DNA and sequence it using long-read technologies, a method that allows them to retrieve massive amounts of information from even a single sample.

For a species that’s difficult to observe, genomics offers a powerful tool. According to Professor Paulette Bloomer, Dominique’s co-supervisor, this kind of data can help answer questions about the whales’ origins, population structure, and long-term conservation prospects. The work has already revealed a previously unknown distinction between inshore and offshore Bryde’s whales in South Africa, suggesting they may be more genetically unique than once believed.

With support from DIPLOMICS, Dominique has been trained in genome assembly and analysis techniques that she is now applying to her own samples. The genome she is working on will also serve as a critical reference for future studies, not just in South Africa, but worldwide.

As the project progresses, the data may contribute to a reassessment of the conservation status of South Africa’s inshore Bryde’s whales, helping to protect a species that, until recently, we knew almost nothing about.

This is genomics in action: helping researchers fill in the blanks, challenge assumptions, and protect the biodiversity on our doorstep.