Abstract: In order to explore the antibacterial mechanism of Weissella confusa ZW21, a strain of lactic acid bacteria from yak milk with good antibacterial activity, its whole genome sequence was analyzed and its antibacterial activity-related functional genes were mined. In this study, the whole genome of W. confusa ZW21 was sequenced and analyzed on the Illumina NovaSeq PE150 platform, and the basic functions of the genome were annotated in the Gene Ontology (GO), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG), Cluster of Orthologous Groups, Non-Redundant Protein databases. The results showed that: (1) the genome size of W. confusa ZW21 was 2.44 Mb, and the GC content was 45.66 %; (2) 2 175 encoding genes were predicted, with a total length of 1 947 771 bp and an average length of 896 bp; and (3) the encoding genes were annotated in the functional database for basic functional annotation and metabolic pathway gene information annotation of the strain’s genome, revealing that the genome contained eight bacteriocin-related genes (such as Colicin V and Lactococcin); three antioxidant activity-related genes; signaling pathways that regulate immunity and inflammation such as the nucleotide oligomerization domain (NOD)-like receptor and peroxisome proliferators-activated receptor (PPAR) signaling pathways, and antifolate encoding genes. In summary, the whole genome sequencing and analysis of W. confusa ZW21 can provide a basis for studying its antibacterial mechanism.

Key words: yak milk; Weissella confusa; whole genome sequencing; gene function annotation; bacteriocin