11 September 2021 Comparing mRNA and sncRNA profiles during the maternal-to-embryonic transition in bovine IVF and scNT embryos
Jocelyn M. Cuthbert, Stewart J. Russell, Irina A. Polejaeva, Qinggang Meng, Kenneth L. White, Abby D. Benninghoff
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Abstract

Production of embryos with high developmental competence by somatic cell nuclear transfer (scNT) is far less efficient than for in vitro fertilized (IVF) embryos, likely due to an accumulation of errors in genome reprogramming that results in aberrant expression of RNA transcripts, including messenger RNAs (mRNA) and, possibly, microRNAs (miRNA). Thus, our objectives were to use RNAseq to determine the dynamics of mRNA expression in early developing scNT and IVF embryos in the context of the maternal-to-embryonic transition (MET) and to correlate apparent transcriptional dysregulation in cloned embryos with miRNA expression profiles. Comparisons between scNT and IVF embryos indicated large scale transcriptome differences, which were most evident at the 8-cell and morula stages for genes associated with biological functions critical for the MET. For two miRNAs previously identified as differentially expressed in scNT morulae, miR-34a and miR-345, negative correlations with some predicted mRNA targets were apparent, though not widespread among the majority of predicted targets. Moreover, although large-scale aberrations in expression of mRNAs were evident during the MET in cattle scNT embryos, these changes were not consistently correlated with aberrations in miRNA expression at the same developmental stage, suggesting that other mechanisms controlling gene expression may be involved.

Summary sentence

Whereas large-scale aberrations in expression of mRNAs were evident during the maternal-to-embryonic transition in cattle scNT embryos, these changes were not consistently correlated with changes in miRNA expression at the same developmental stage.

Graphical Abstract

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© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Society for the Study of Reproduction. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com
Jocelyn M. Cuthbert, Stewart J. Russell, Irina A. Polejaeva, Qinggang Meng, Kenneth L. White, and Abby D. Benninghoff "Comparing mRNA and sncRNA profiles during the maternal-to-embryonic transition in bovine IVF and scNT embryos," Biology of Reproduction 105(6), 1401-1415, (11 September 2021). https://doi.org/10.1093/biolre/ioab169
Received: 3 February 2021; Accepted: 2 September 2021; Published: 11 September 2021
KEYWORDS
embryo development
maternal-to-embryonic transition
microRNA
somatic cell nuclear transfer
transcriptome
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