The detection and functions of RNA modification mA based on mA writers and erasers.

N-methyladenosine (mA) is the most frequent chemical modification in eukaryotic mRNA and is known to participate in a variety of physiological processes, including cancer progression and viral infection. The reversible and dynamic mA modification is installed by mA methyltransferase (writer) enzymes and erased by mA demethylase (eraser) enzymes. mA modification recognized by mA binding proteins (readers) regulates RNA processing and metabolism, leading to downstream biological effects such as promotion of stability and translation or increased degradation. The mA writers and erasers determine the abundance of mA modifications and play decisive roles in its distribution and function. In this review, we focused on mA writers and erasers and present an overview on their known functions and enzymatic molecular mechanisms, showing how they recognize substrates and install or remove mA modifications. We also summarize the current applications of mA writers and erasers for mA detection and highlight the merits and drawbacks of these available methods. Lastly, we describe the biological functions of mA in cancers and viral infection based on research of mA writers and erasers and introduce new assays for mA functionality via programmable mA editing tools.