Abstract
Background: To explore advanced glycation end products (AGEs)-induced m6A modification in fibroblasts and its potential role in photoaging. Methods: We studied m6A modification in AGEs-bovine serum albumin-treated fibroblasts with m6A-mRNA & lncRNA epitranscriptomic microarray and bioinformatics analysis. The m6A modification level was also investigated in skin samples. Results: m6A methylation microarray analysis revealed m6A modification profiles in AGEs-treated fibroblasts. Gene ontology, Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes, protein–protein interaction and competing endogenous RNA network analysis indicated that the genes of differentially methylated mRNAs and lncRNAs were mainly related to inflammation processes. We also found that AGEs-bovine serum albumin dose-dependently increased the m6A level and METTL14 expression in both fibroblasts and sun-exposed skin. Conclusion: Our study provided novel information regarding alterations of m6A modifications in AGEs-induced dermal fibroblasts and potential targets for treatment of photoaging.
Supplementary data
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to especially thank M Wan and Y Xie for providing tissue samples obtained from donors in the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University.
Financial & competing interests disclosure
This work was supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 81773340) and Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (no. 2021A1515012622). The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.
No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.
Ethical conduct of research
Informed written consent of patients was obtained before all skin tissues resection and the consent procedure was conducted according to the principles expressed in the Declaration of Helsinki. All studies used were approved by the Ethical Committee of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China (no. [2014]2–64 and [2017]2–11).