Two of the genetic pathways that may be altered by defects in epigenetic reprogramming are zygotic gene activation (ZGA) and the establishment of pluripotency. Elongation initiation factor 1a (eIf1A) has been used to monitor the onset of ZGA while transcription factors Oct4, Nanog and Sox2 play central roles in regulating the pluripotent state. Chromatin remodeling contributes to epigenetic reprogramming and is critical for embryogenesis. SNF2-type chromatin remodeling complexes use the energy released by ATP hydrolysis to reposition nucleosomes in promoter regions, thus, altering the accessibility of transcription factors and other epigenetic modifying enzymes. These chromatin remodeling complexes consist of multiple subunits, with the core catalytic subunit being an ATPase; the ATPase subunit present in the complex determines the function of the complex. We have previously demonstrated that altering the amount of the ATPase Brahma via ectopic over-expression leads to arrested development in porcine embryos. The experiments described were carried out to test the two following hypotheses: 1) Altering the amount of Brahma mRNA results in mis-regulation of key genes related to pluripotency and ZGA and 2) altering the amount of Brahma mRNA alters the expression of other SNF2-type ATPases. In vitro matured porcine oocytes were electro-activated and assigned randomly to one of four treatments: Co-injection of wildtype Brahma mRNA and GFP mRNA (WT), co-injection of mRNA encoding a dominant negative version of Brahma and GFP mRNA (DN), injection of GFP mRNA alone (GFP) and no injection (NON). Following allocation to treatment and mRNA injection, embryos were cultured for 48 hours (4-cell stage) in PZM3 and mRNA was extracted. After reverse transcription, real-time PCR was performed to quantify the relative amount of eIF1a, Oct4, Sox2 and Nanog as well as a set of SNF2-type chromatin remodeling ATPases (Brg1, SNF2H, SNF2L, CHD3 and CHD5). Fold differences were calculated with the formula 2ΔΔCt using non-injected embryo group as a calibrator stage; data were analyzed by ANOVA and Tukeys multi-comparison post-test. A p value<0.05 was considered significant. Results from these experiments show that Oct4, Nanog and eIF1A transcript levels were unchanged across our four treatment groups. Interestingly, embryos injected with dominant negative Brahma mRNA showed a 3.8 fold increase in Sox2 transcript level as compared to non injected embryos (DN vs NON, p<0.05). In addition, examination of the transcript abundance of SNF2-type chromatin remodeling ATPases revealed that SNF2L transcripts were increased significantly in embryo injected with wildtype Brahma as compared to all other groups (WT vs DN, NON and GFP, p<0.05). No significant difference was detected between any of the other groups. We concluded that the arrest in porcine embryo development observed after Brahma mRNA microinjection does not involve a major disruption in transcript abundance of transcription factors that regulate pluripotency or that serve as markers for ZGA. Interestingly, Brahma overexpression leads to a significant increase in SNF2L transcript abundance. SNF2L is known to be primarily expressed in differentiated cells; previous studies from our lab have shown that SNF2L is in very low abundance during porcine embryo cleavage development. This work shows that maintaining proper levels of chromatin modifying enzymes is critical for cleavage development.