Frontiers in Neuroscience (May 2022)

Transcriptome-Wide N6-Methyladenosine Methylome Alteration in the Rat Spinal Cord After Acute Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury

  • Jiangtao Yu,
  • Haihua Chen,
  • Haihua Chen,
  • Haoli Ma,
  • Zhongxiang Zhang,
  • Xiaolu Zhu,
  • Pengcheng Wang,
  • Ruining Liu,
  • Xiaoqing Jin,
  • Xiaoqing Jin,
  • Yan Zhao,
  • Yan Zhao

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2022.848119
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 16

Abstract

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Recent studies showed that RNA N6-methyladenosine (m6A) plays an important role in neurological diseases. We used methylated RNA immunoprecipitation sequencing (MeRIP-Seq) technology to generate the m6A modification map after traumatic spinal cord injury (TSCI). A total of 2,609 differential m6A peaks were identified after TSCI. Our RNA sequencing results after TSCI showed 4,206 genes with significantly altered expression. Cross-link analysis of m6A sequencing results and RNA sequencing results showed that 141 hyper-methylated genes were upregulated, 53 hyper-methylated genes were downregulated, 57 hypo-methylated genes were upregulated, and 197 hypo-methylated genes were downregulated. Among these, the important inflammatory response factor Tlr4 and the important member of the neurotrophin family Ngf were both upregulated and hyper-methylated after TSCI. This study provides that in the future, the epigenetic modifications of the genes could be used as an indicator of TSCI.

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