Skip to main content
. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2020 Dec 29.
Published in final edited form as: Nat Biotechnol. 2020 Jun 29;38(12):1431–1440. doi: 10.1038/s41587-020-0572-6

Figure 1. Overview of cellular modification of adenine to m6A in mRNA, and design of a targeted RNA methylation system.

Figure 1.

(a) METTL3 and METTL14 form a “writer” complex that catalyzes S-adenosyl methionine (SAM)-dependent methylation of the N6 of adenine in cellular mRNA. Additional components influence the formation and activity of this core complex. FTO and ALKBH5 (“erasers”) remove the methyl group of m6A. “Readers” recognize the mark on RNA and direct it to various outcomes. (b) Proposed strategy for targeted RNA methylation (TRM). A programmable RNA-binding protein such as dCas13 when fused to an appropriate methyltransferase complex mediates the guide RNA-specified methylation of A to m6A site-specifically in a target transcript.