Andy Murray has been seeded sixth for the US Open while Spain's Rafael Nadal will be the top seed in a grand slam event for the first time in his career.

The newly-crowned world number one will be followed by Roger Federer of Switzerland, Novak Djokovic of Serbia, David Ferrer of Spain and Nikolay Davydenko of Russia after the seedings where announced.

After spending 160 consecutive weeks ranked second, Nadal officially became the new world number one on Monday to end Federer's record reign of 237 successive weeks.

A 12-time grand slam champion, Federer was the top seed at the last 18 majors.

The highest-seeded American is number eight Andy Roddick, who won the event in 2003, while countryman James Blake is just a spot back as the number nine.

Murray will be looking to overcome his disappointing early exit from the Beijing Olympics and rediscover the form that took him to success at the Cincinnati Masters.

The British number one's best effort in New York was in 2006 when he reached the fourth round.

Like the men's seedings, there were no major surprises in the women's draw, where top-ranked Ana Ivanovic is the number one, followed by Jelena Jankovic, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Serena Williams and Elena Dementieva.

French Open runner-up Dinara Safina is the number six seed, and Wimbledon champion Venus Williams is the seventh seed.

The most notable absence on the women's side is world number six and 2006 champion Maria Sharapova, who announced earlier this month that she is missing the event to recover from a shoulder injury.

The singles draws for the US Open will be announced on Thursday.