Profiling of N6-methyladenosine methylation in porcine longissimus dorsi muscle and unravelling the hub gene ADIPOQ promotes adipogenesis in an m(6)A-YTHDF1–dependent manner

BACKGROUND: Intramuscular fat (IMF) content is a critical indicator of pork quality, and abnormal IMF is also relevant to human disease as well as aging. Although N6-methyladenosine (m(6)A) RNA modification was recently found to regulate adipogenesis in porcine intramuscular fat, however, the underlying molecular mechanisms was still unclear. RESULTS: In this work, we collected 20 longissimus dorsi muscle samples with high (average 3.95%) or low IMF content (average 1.22%) from a unique heterogenous swine population for m(6)A sequencing (m(6)A-seq). We discovered 70 genes show both differential RNA expression and m(6)A modification from high and low IMF group, including ADIPOQ and SFRP1, two hub genes inferred through gene co-expression analysis. Particularly, we observed ADIPOQ, which contains three m(6)A modification sites within 3′ untranslated and protein coding region, could promote porcine intramuscular preadipocyte differentiation in an m(6)A-dependent manner. Furthermore, we found the YT521‑B homology domain family protein 1 (YTHDF1) could target and promote ADIPOQ mRNA translation. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provided a comprehensive profiling of m(6)A methylation in porcine longissimus dorsi muscle and characterized the involvement of m(6)A epigenetic modification in the regulation of ADIPOQ mRNA on IMF deposition through an m(6)A-YTHDF1-dependent manner. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s40104-023-00833-4.