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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2017 Aug 4.
Published in final edited form as: Nat Chem Biol. 2013 Apr;9(4):232–240. doi: 10.1038/nchembio.1199

Figure 4. Illustrations of RNAi-based methods for target-identification and mechanism-of-action studies.

Figure 4

(a) In one implementation, phenotypes from genome-wide RNAi are compared to those induced by a small molecule (SM) of interest; full or partial phenocopy of the small-molecule effect by RNAi provides evidence that the gene product is a small-molecule target92. (b) When prior evidence suggests a particular target pathway, focused sets of RNA reagents can help to generate mechanistic hypotheses. In general, RNAi can enhance or suppress small-molecule effects, as in genetic epistasis analysis; in practice, more complex relationships among proteins than those illustrated may also exist93.