[carbocation]

It’s a good question. The answer is no, before this study we didn’t have a gapless “x_chromosome.txt”. We did have 97% of it, but there were parts that were missing here and there. In fact, because the answer is no - which admittedly probably seems wild - this work is very important.

Now, there are much more sophisticated answers, and downstream points to be made about graph genomes instead of a reference, etc (which would also get to your point about why geneticists don’t talk about it this way). But, that’s a broader scope.