Department of Anorectal Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Heifei, China.
School of Basic Medical Sciences, Shandong University, Jinan, China.
Mol Cancer. 2022 Aug 16;21(1):163. doi: 10.1186/s12943-022-01634-5.
Gastrointestinal cancer is the most common human malignancy characterized by high lethality and poor prognosis. Emerging evidences indicate that N6-methyladenosine (m6A), the most abundant post-transcriptional modification in eukaryotes, exerts important roles in regulating mRNA metabolism including stability, decay, splicing, transport, and translation. As the key component of the m6A methyltransferase complex, methyltransferase-like 14 (METTL14) catalyzes m6A methylation on mRNA or non-coding RNA to regulate gene expression and cell phenotypes. Dysregulation of METTL14 was deemed to be involved in various aspects of gastrointestinal cancer, such as tumorigenesis, progression, chemoresistance, and metastasis. Plenty of findings have opened up new avenues for exploring the therapeutic potential of gastrointestinal cancer targeting METTL14. In this review, we systematically summarize the recent advances regarding the biological functions of METTL14 in gastrointestinal cancer, discuss its potential clinical applications and propose the research forecast.
胃肠道癌症是最常见的人类恶性肿瘤，其特点是致死率高、预后差。新出现的证据表明，N6-甲基腺苷（m6A）是真核生物中最丰富的转录后修饰，它在调节 mRNA 代谢中发挥重要作用，包括稳定性、降解、剪接、运输和翻译。作为 m6A 甲基转移酶复合物的关键组成部分，甲基转移酶样蛋白 14（METTL14）在 mRNA 或非编码 RNA 上催化 m6A 甲基化，以调节基因表达和细胞表型。METTL14 的失调被认为参与了胃肠道癌症的各个方面，如肿瘤发生、进展、化疗耐药和转移。大量的研究结果为探索针对 METTL14 的胃肠道癌症治疗潜力开辟了新途径。在这篇综述中，我们系统地总结了 METTL14 在胃肠道癌症中的生物学功能的最新进展，讨论了其潜在的临床应用，并提出了研究展望。
