SINE‐Associated LncRNA SAWPA Regulates Porcine Zygotic Genome Activation

Abstract In mice, retrotransposon‐associated long noncoding RNAs (lncRNA) play important regulatory roles in pre‐implantation development; however, it is largely unknown whether they function in the pre‐implantation development in pigs. The current study aims to screen for retrotransposon‐associated lncRNA in porcine early embryos and identifies a porcine 8‐cell embryo‐specific SINE‐associated nuclear long noncoding RNA named SAWPA. SAWPA is essential for porcine embryonic development as depletion of SAWPA results in a developmental arrest at the 8‐cell stage, accompanied by the inhibition of the JNK‐MAPK signaling pathway. Mechanistically, SAWPA works in trans as a transcription factor for JNK through the formation of an RNA‐protein complex with HNRNPA1 and MED8 binding the SINE elements upstream of JNK. Therefore, as the first functional SINE‐associated long noncoding RNAs in pigs, SAWPA provides novel insights for the mechanism research on retrotransposons in mammalian pre‐implantation development.