METTL3 Promotes Histone H3K9 Acetylation through Recruitment of Histone Acetyltransferase 1 to Chromatin II

METTL3 constitutes the catalytic subunit of the major methyltransferase complex mediating the formation of N6-methyladenosine (m6A) in mRNA. Although the resulting m6A is known to regulate numerous cellular processes, the protein interaction network of this complex remains largely unknown. Here, we employed ascorbate peroxidase-based proximity labeling followed by LC-MS/MS analysis to examine systematically the interaction proteins of METTL3 and METTL14 in HEK293T cells. Aside from many proteins involved in mRNA splicing, a subset of histone regulatory proteins are enriched in the proximity proteome of METTL3, including histone acetyltransferase 1 (HAT1). In addition, genetic ablation of METTL3 led to reduced chromatin occupancy of HAT1 isoform-a, which is expressed exclusively in the nucleus, and diminished H3K9Ac in HEK293T cells, especially in retrotransposons. Depletion of HAT1 led to diminished H3K9Ac, which could be restored by wild-type HAT but not the one fused with the nuclear export sequence (NES) of PKI to remove it from the nucleus. Our in vitro acetylation assay further confirmed the acetylation activity of HAT1 isoform-a on nucleosome histone H3K9. The reduced retrotransposons H3K9Ac in METTL3-/- cells could be restored by ectopic expression of wild-type METTL3, but not its catalytically inactive D395A mutant. Together, we assessed the protein interactome of METTL3, uncovered a new function of HAT1 in acetylating H3K9 in chromatin, and revealed a crosstalk between METTL3-mediated formation of m6A and HAT1-catalyzed formation of H3K9Ac in chromatin.