Genome comparison of African swine fever virus China/2018/Anhui XCGQ strain and related European p72 Genotype II strains

African swine fever was introduced into China in August 2018 and led to high mortality in domestic pigs. We reported the genome characterization of the China/2018/AnhuiXCGQ strain mainly based on next-generation sequencing and comparison with related European p72 Genotype II strains. The genome was 189,393 bp long, encoding 181 open reading frames. Pair-wise genome sequence comparison revealed 54-107 variation sites between China/2018/AnhuiXCGQ and the other genotype II virulent strains contributing to the change of expression or alteration of amino acid residues in 10-38 genes. China/2018/AnhuiXCGQ strain shared the highest similarity with POL/2015/Podlaskie strain. Phylogenetic analysis based on a 125 kb long conserved central region revealed that the China/2018/AnhuiXCGQ strain and four European genotype II strains were grouped into three clusters. This study expanded our knowledge on the genetic diversity and evolution of ASFV and provided valuable information for diagnosis improvement and vaccine development.