"But we've now got the blueprint as well as the plans to the factory," he said.

Already Professor White's team has used the toad's genetics to find three new viruses that, with further work, may become biocontrols to stem the toad's march across the country.

"We're now going to see how prevalent they are in the population, going all the way back to South America, and then we'll see how pathogenic they are," he said.

"Hopefully, they're very pathogenic, and then we can begin testing them."

Professor White said the team needed to be sure any biocontrol created would not affect native amphibians.

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"We don't want to introduce anything that's going to kill frogs or newts; it has to be cane toad specific," he said.

“Current measures like physical removal haven’t been successful, but new methods to teach native species not to eat the toad – called taste aversion – give new hope. However, we need more approaches to control this invasive species."

Senior lecturer Dr Rich Edwards, lead author of the study, said: “Sequencing and assembling a genome is a complicated process. By using the cutting-edge sequencing technology and expertise available at UNSW, we sequenced 360-odd billion base pairs and assembled one of the best quality amphibian genomes to date.

“We managed to decipher more than 90 per cent of the cane toad genes using technology that can sequence very long pieces of DNA, which makes the task of putting together the genome jigsaw much easier.”

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Cane toad expert and Emeritus Professor Rick Shine from the University of Sydney, said: “Future analysis of the genome will provide insights into cane toad evolution and enrich our understanding of their interplay with the ecosystem at large.

"It will help us understand how the toad spreads, how its toxin works, and provide new avenues to try to control its population.

“Very few amphibian genomes have been sequenced to date, so this is also great news for amphibians. Having a reference genome could provide valuable insights into how invasive species evolve to adapt to new environments.”

In using a virus to help control the toad population, the toad’s genetic material is essential.

“To find a virus for biocontrol, we need access to the toad’s DNA and RNA,” said Alice Russo, a PhD student at UNSW who specialises on finding potential viruses to control the toad.

“DNA contains ancient fragments of viruses – the DNA of every animal can sometimes catalogue past infections.”

Viruses have previously been successfully used to control the European rabbit population.

The findings were published in the academic journal GigaScience.

A decade ago, researchers in Western Australia tried to sequence the cane toad genome, but they encountered obstacles when it came to assembling it, and did not complete the project.