Parthenogenesis activation (PA), as an important artificial breeding method, can stably preserve the dominant genotype of a species. However, the delayed development of PA embryos is still overly severe and largely leads to pre-implantation failure in pigs. The mechanisms underlying the deficiencies of PA embryos have not been completely understood. For further understanding of the molecular mechanism behind PA embryo failure, we performed transcriptome analysis among pig oocytes (meiosis II, MII) and early embryos at three developmental stages (zygote, morula, and blastocyst) in vitro fertilization (IVF) and PA group. Totally, 11,110 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), 4694 differentially expressed lincRNAs (DELs) were identified, and most DEGs enriched the regulation of apoptotic processes. Through cis- and trans-manner functional prediction, we found that hub lincRNAs were mostly involved in abnormal parthenogenesis embryonic development. In addition, twenty DE imprinted genes showed that some paternally imprinted genes in IVF displayed higher expression than that in PA. Notably, we identified that three DELs of imprinted genes (MEST, PLAGL1, and DIRAS3) were up regulated in IVF, and there was no significant change in PA group. Disordered expression of key genes for embryonic development might play key roles in abnormal parthenogenesis embryonic development. Our study indicates that embryos derived from different production techniques have varied in vitro development to the blastocyst stage, and they also affect the transcription level of corresponding genes, such as imprinted genes. This work will help future research on these genes and molecular-assisted breeding for pig parthenotes.

中文翻译：

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猪早期胚胎发育过程中体外受精和孤雌生殖激活的转录组分析

孤雌生殖激活（PA）作为一种重要的人工育种方法，可以稳定保存一个物种的优势基因型。然而，PA胚胎的延迟发育仍然过于严重，并在很大程度上导致猪的着床前失败。PA胚胎缺陷的潜在机制尚未完全了解。为了进一步了解 PA 胚胎失败背后的分子机制，我们在体外受精 (IVF) 和 PA 组中对猪卵母细胞（减数分裂 II、MII）和三个发育阶段（合子、桑椹胚和囊胚）的早期胚胎进行了转录组分析。共鉴定出11110个差异表达基因（DEGs），4694个差异表达lincRNAs（DELs），大多数差异表达基因丰富了细胞凋亡过程的调控。通过顺式和反式功能预测，我们发现hub lincRNAs主要参与异常的孤雌生殖胚胎发育。此外，20个DE印迹基因显示IVF中一些父系印迹基因的表达高于PA。值得注意的是，我们确定了三个印记基因的 DEL（MEST、PLAGL1和DIRAS3 ) 在 IVF 中上调，而 PA 组没有显着变化。胚胎发育关键基因的无序表达可能在异常孤雌生殖胚胎发育中起关键作用。我们的研究表明，来自不同生产技术的胚胎在体外发育到囊胚阶段的过程中存在差异，它们也会影响相应基因的转录水平，例如印迹基因。这项工作将有助于未来对这些基因的研究和猪单性生殖的分子辅助育种。