MINI REVIEW article
Front. Genet.
Sec. RNA
This article is part of the Research TopicInsights in RNA: 2025View all 3 articles
RNA-triggered innate immunity: friend and foe
Provisionally accepted
- King's College London, London, United Kingdom
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Endogenous, or 'self', vs microbial, or 'non-self', RNA sensing can tip the scales between immune pathology and effective immunity. Cells are equipped to sense RNA, fundamental to trigger an innate immune response to clear viral infection that should not generate a harmful immune response against endogenous RNA. Multiple chemical modifications in RNA fine-tune its cellular sensing and are exploited by pathogens to evade immunity. Likewise, perturbations triggering self RNA sensing cause immune pathologies. This underscores the clinical need for a better understanding of self RNA recognition. Here, we address nucleic acid sensing in the innate immune response from an RNA-centric view. We discuss how self RNA is shielded from sensing by chemical modifications and subcellular compartmentalization, possible mechanisms and consequences of self-RNA sensing, and how this knowledge has been harnessed to revolutionize vaccine development.
Keywords: host vspathogen, immune pathology, innate immunity, mRNA therapeutics, RNA modifications, RNA sensing
Received: 25 Dec 2025; Accepted: 31 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Henschel, Conte and Martinez-Nunez. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Rocio Teresa Martinez-Nunez
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