RNA编辑是重要的转录后修饰，包括A-to-I 编辑和C-to-U编辑。RNA编辑对于转录组的多样性具有重要意义，在细胞的发育和分化过程中起重要作用,其异常在肿瘤等多种重大疾病都有报道。鉴定RNA编辑的常用方法是把RNA测序读段与参照基因组序列进行比对后，再与完整的SNP数据库比对，筛除来自SNP的变异位点，从而获得RNA编辑位点。然而，绝大多数物种都不具有完整的SNP数据库，限制了对RNA编辑的研究。在前期研究中，我们发现RNA编辑位点和SNP在基因组中具有不同的分布特征。因而，我们计划利用该特征，开发一不依赖于SNP数据库的鉴定RNA编辑的新算法，并应用该方法对公共数据库的RNA测序数据从多组织、多发育阶段和多物种层面上研究RNA编辑的生物学功能。我们还计划利用单细胞测序实验，在细胞水平上研究RNA编辑。本项目的实施对于促进RNA编辑的研究、理解RNA编辑的生物学意义有重要意义。

RNA editing is defined as post-transcriptional alteration of RNA sequences, including A-to-I editing and C-to-U editing. RNA editing is of great importance on transcriptome diversity, and may play important roles in cell development and differentiation. Abnormal RNA editing was reported in many diseases including cancer. Common methods on detecting RNA editing from RNA-seq data typically map RNA-seq reads to a reference genome to identify Single Nucleotide Variations (SNVs), which are then filtered by a complete SNP database to identify RNA editing sites (RESs). However, most organisms currently do not have a complete SNP database, limiting the study of RNA editing to a broad field. In our recent work, we discovered that RESs and SNPs exhibited significantly different distribution in the genome. Therefore, we plan to develop a novel method for detecting RESs based on the distribution pattern of RESs, which will allow us to identify RESs without the need of a SNP database. We next plan to download RNA-seq data from public domain and apply the newly developed method to identify RESs, and to investigate the biological roles of RNA editing from the perspective of tissues, development stages, and organisms. We also plan to carry out single cell RNA sequencing, and to analyse RNA editing at the level of single cell. With the new tool, the proposed project will greatly accelerate the study of RNA editing, and will contribute to our understanding of the biological role of RNA editing.