Integrative analyses of translatome and transcriptome reveal important translational controls in brown and white adipose regulated by microRNAs

The epidemic of obesity and diabetes has markedly spurred the research interest in adipocyte biology. Brown adipocytes are specialized for energy expenditure and of therapeutic interest for treatment of metabolic diseases, but how brown adipocytes are distinguished from white adipocytes at the level of translational regulation remains poorly understood. To systemically determine the translational control of gene expression in adipose tissue, we performed ribosome profiling and RNA-seq in parallel to depict the translatome and transcriptome changes during primary brown and white adipogenesis, and between brown and white adipose tissue. The most prominent layer of translational regulation was the increased translation efficiency of genes encoding mitochondria components in brown adipocytes relative to white. Systemic analysis of the regulatory interactions between microRNAs and their targets revealed that microRNAs were more active in repressing targets’ mRNA abundance and translation in brown fat. Together, our data comprehensively delineated a landscape integrating transcriptome and translatome in adipose tissue.