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EPIGENETICS

Reassessing 6mA in eukaryotes

Nature Methods volume 19, page 270 (2022)Cite this article

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A metagenomic approach to identifying the sources of N6-methyldeoxyadenine (6mA) in eukaryotic DNA found no evidence of high 6mA abundances in sampled eukaryotes.

In 2012, Gang Fang and his team at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai completed the first map of 6mA in a bacterium using single-molecule real-time (SMRT) sequencing. When they examined SMRT sequencing data from multicellular eukaryotes (for example, Drosophila), their analyses suggested a much lower level of 6mA than previously reported. The discrepancy motivated the researchers to take a closer look at the data. Fang says, “By reassessing every raw read, rather than only those that map to eukaryotic genomes of interest, we found reads that suggest bacterial contamination.”

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Research paper

  • Kong, Y. et al. Critical assessment of DNA adenine methylation in eukaryotes using quantitative deconvolution. Science 375, 515–522 (2022).

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  1. Nature Methods http://www.nature.com/nmeth

    Lei Tang

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  1. Lei Tang
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Correspondence to Lei Tang.

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Tang, L. Reassessing 6mA in eukaryotes. Nat Methods 19, 270 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-022-01434-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-022-01434-1

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