Volatile, Lipidomic and Transcriptomic Profiles of Longissimus Muscle from Yunong Black and Landrace Pigs: An Exploratory Comparison

The molecular basis underlying the characteristics of the newly bred Yunong Black (YN) pork remains unclear. Here, we integrated flavoromics, lipidomics, and transcriptomics to characterize breed-associated differences in pork flavor-related traits between YN and Landrace (L) pigs. Transcriptomic and lipidomic analyses revealed breed-associated differences in the expression of genes related to lipid metabolism and in muscle lipid composition. Although exploratory integrative correlation analyses identified pairwise correlations among selected genes, lipid species, and volatile compounds, none of the volatile–gene or gene–lipid associations remained significant after adjustment for breed. These findings highlight the importance of accounting for breed effects when interpreting multi-omics correlations and provide fundamental data on the molecular features associated with breed-related variation in pork flavor. These findings provide a basis for further investigations into the molecular features associated with variation in pork quality and flavor-related traits.