Abstract

Intramuscular fat is positively related to meat quality including tenderness, flavor, and juiciness. Long noncoding RNA (LncRNA) plays a vital role in regulating adipogenesis. However, it is largely unknown about lncRNAs associated with porcine intramuscular adipocyte adipogenesis. In the present study, we focus on a novel LncRNA, which is named lncIMF2, associated with adipogenesis by our previous RNA-sequence analysis and bioinformatics analysis. We demonstrated LncIMF2 knockdown inhibited the proliferation of porcine intramuscular adipocytes while expression of cell cycle-related genes was decreased. Besides, we found LncIMF2 knockdown inhibited expression of adipogenic differentiation marker genes including PPARγ (Peroxisome proliferator-activated reporter gamma) and ATGL (Adipose triglyceride lipase). Similarly, overexpression of LncIMF2 promotes proliferation and differentiation of porcine intramuscular preadipocytes. Moreover, we proved that IncIMF2 acts as a molecular sponge for MicroRNA-217 (miR-217), which has been found associated with adipogenesis, thereby affecting the expression of the miR-217 target gene. Collectively, our findings will contribute to a deeper understanding of the role of LncRNA in pig IMF deposition for the improvement of meat quality.

摘要

肌内脂肪与肉质（包括嫩度、风味和多汁性）呈正相关。长链非编码 RNA (LncRNA) 在调节脂肪形成中起着至关重要的作用。然而，与猪肌内脂肪细胞脂肪生成相关的 lncRNA 在很大程度上是未知的。在本研究中，我们关注一种名为 lncIMF2 的新型 LncRNA，通过我们之前的 RNA 序列分析和生物信息学分析，它与脂肪生成相关。我们证明 LncIMF2 敲低抑制了猪肌内脂肪细胞的增殖，同时细胞周期相关基因的表达降低。此外，我们发现 LncIMF2 敲低抑制了脂肪形成分化标记基因的表达，包括PPARγ（过氧化物酶体增殖物激活报告基因伽玛）和ATGL（脂肪甘油三酯脂肪酶）。同样，LncIMF2 的过表达促进了猪肌内前脂肪细胞的增殖和分化。此外，我们证明 IncIMF2 充当 MicroRNA-217 (miR-217) 的分子海绵，已发现与脂肪生成相关，从而影响 miR-217 靶基因的表达。总的来说，我们的研究结果将有助于更深入地了解 LncRNA 在猪 IMF 沉积中对改善肉质的作用。