Omics as a Window To Unravel the Dynamic Changes of Egg Components during Chicken Embryonic Development

Abstract

Chicken egg, as a completely aseptic and self-sufficient biological entity, contains all of the components required for embryonic development. As such, it constitutes not only an excellent model to study the mechanisms of early embryo nutrition and disease origin but can also be used to develop egg-based products with specific applications. Different omics disciplines, like transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics, represent promising approaches to assess nutritional and functional molecules in eggs under development. However, these individual molecules do not act in isolation during the dynamic embryogenic process (e.g., migration, transportation, and absorption). Unless we integrate the information from all of these omics disciplines, there will remain an unbridged gap in the systematic and holistic assessment of the information from one omics level to the other. This integrative review of the dynamic molecular processes of the different chicken egg components involved in embryo development describes the critical interplay between the egg components and their implications in immunity, hematopoiesis, organ formation, and nutrient transport functions during the embryonic process.

Developmental changes in lipid and fatty acid metabolism and the inhibition by in ovo feeding oleic acid in Muscovy duck embryogenesis

“…The avian embryo is a multifaceted model system for studying developmental mechanisms, such as organ morphogenesis, nervous system development and maternal effects on embryogenesis ( Clayton and Emery, 2015 ; Groothuis et al., 2019 ; Hirst and Marcelle, 2015 ; Kulesa et al., 2013 ). During incubation, the development of poultry embryos depends on the nutrient composition of the eggs, and these functional molecules exert their effects systematically ( Meng et al., 2021a ; Moran, 2007 ). Lipid distribution in the yolk sac varies at different embryonic stages and is transferred to embryos through the highly vascularized yolk sac membrane or directly into the intestine via the yolk stalk ( Meng et al., 2021b ; van der Wagt et al., 2020 ).…”