Yuhang Jiang

In mammals, skeletal muscle development is a complex biological process regulated by many factors. N6-methyladenosine (m6A) RNA modification plays an important role in many biological processes. However, the regulation of m6A on skeletal muscle growth and development in adult goats remains unclear. In this study, Duan goats (DA) and Nubia goats (NBY), both female and 12 months old, were selected as the research objects, and m6A-Seq and RNA-Seq were mainly used to detect the difference of m6A modification and gene expression during the development of the longissimus dorsi (LD) muscle in the two breeds. The results showed that compared with DA, the meat production performance of NBY was better than that of DA, and the modification level of m6A was higher than that of DA in LD. The m6A-Seq of LD indicated m6A peaks were mainly enriched in the coding sequence (CDS) and stop codon. A total of 161 differentially methylated genes (DMGs) and 1294 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified in two breeds. GO and KEGG analysis showed that DMGs were closely related to cellular metabolism, and most of DMGs were enriched in pathways related to energy metabolism, muscle growth and development, mainly MAPK signaling pathway, Wnt signaling pathway and CGMP-PKG signaling pathway. The DEGs were significantly enriched in actin binding, calcium ion binding, angiogenesis, and other biological processes, and most of them were enriched in PI3K-Akt and CGMP-PKG signaling pathways. Combined analysis of m6A-Seq and RNA-Seq data revealed a negative correlation between differentially methylated m6A levels and mRNA abundance, and mRNA expression of the gene with m6A peak near 3′UTR will decrease. In addition, 11 DMGs regulating cell differentiation, muscle growth and development were identified. This study displayed the m6A profiles and distribution patterns in the goat transcriptome, determined the potential role of m6A modification in muscle growth and provided a new reference for the further study of goat skeletal muscle development.

Resveratrol (RES) has a wide range of biological and pharmacological activities with various health benefits for humans as a food additive. In animal production, RES has been considered a potential functional feed additive for producing high-quality pork. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have emerged as essential regulators of fat metabolism, and phytochemicals can regulate fat metabolism through lncRNA. However, it is unclear whether RES can improve back-fat thickness by regulating lncRNA. In this study, we identified a novel lncRNA, which was named a long intergenic non-protein coding RNA, a regulator of fat metabolism (LincRNA-ROFM), from our previous lncRNA sequencing data. LincRNA-ROFM can inhibit adipocyte proliferation and differentiation. In-depth analyses showed that LincRNA-ROFM acts as a molecular sponge for miR-133b, and adiponectin (AdipoQ) is a direct target of miR-133b in porcine preadipocytes. In addition, the expression of LincRNA-ROFM was positively correlated with AdipoQ. RES can promote the expression of LincRNA-ROFM by PPARα and C/EBPα. Altogether, our research showed that LincRNA-ROFM acts as a ceRNA to sequester miR-133b and is upregulated by RES, leading to heightened AdipoQ expression, and thus decreased adipocyte proliferation and differentiation, which reduces back-fat thickness of pigs. Taken together, the RES/LincRNA-ROFM/miR-133b/AdipoQ regulatory network preliminarily explains the mechanism of action of RES in inhibiting fat deposition, which provides new insight into the downstream mechanism of RES inhibition of fat deposits by regulating the lncRNA.

This study investigated the effects of resveratrol (RES) supplementation on the growth performance, carcass and meat quality, blood lipid levels and ruminal bacterial microbiota of fattening goats. A total of forty castrated Nubian goats (28.25 ± 0.26 kg body weight) were randomly divided into four groups and provided with diets containing different levels of RES (0, 150, 300 and 600 mg/kg) for 120 d. The results showed that RES increased redness and intramuscular fat content, whilst reducing shear force in the longissimus dorsi muscle of goats (p < 0.05). In addition, the final weight, average daily gain, hot carcass weight, net meat weight, carcass lean percentage and eye muscle area of goats were significantly increased in the 150 mg/kg RES group compared with the other three groups, while those in the 600 mg/kg RES group significantly decreased (p < 0.05). RES significantly decreased serum triacylglycerol and LDL-C contents (p < 0.05), and increased HDL-C content and the HDL-C/TC ratio (p < 0.05). Supplementation with 150 mg/kg RES also increased the proportion of Acetitomaculum and Moryella, genera comprising short-chain fatty acid-producing bacteria. The present study indicated that an appropriate supplemental level of RES could improve the growth performance, neat percentage, meat quality, ruminal microbiota and serum lipid levels of fattening goats.