m⁶A modification of mutant huntingtin RNA promotes the biogenesis of pathogenic huntingtin transcripts

EMBO Rep. 2024 Oct 11. doi: 10.1038/s44319-024-00283-7. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

In Huntington's disease (HD), aberrant processing of huntingtin (HTT) mRNA produces HTT1a transcripts that encode the pathogenic HTT exon 1 protein. The mechanisms behind HTT1a production are not fully understood. Considering the role of m⁶A in RNA processing and splicing, we investigated its involvement in HTT1a generation. Here, we show that m⁶A methylation is increased before the cryptic poly(A) sites (IpA1 and IpA2) within the huntingtin RNA in the striatum of Hdh+/Q111 mice and human HD samples. We further assessed m⁶A's role in mutant Htt mRNA processing by pharmacological inhibition and knockdown of METTL3, as well as targeted demethylation of Htt intron 1 using a dCas13-ALKBH5 system in HD mouse cells. Our data reveal that Htt1a transcript levels are regulated by both METTL3 and the methylation status of Htt intron 1. They also show that m⁶A methylation in intron 1 depends on expanded CAG repeats. Our findings highlight a potential role for m⁶A in aberrant splicing of Htt mRNA.

PMID:39394467 | DOI:10.1038/s44319-024-00283-7