EpGAT: integrating epigenetics and 3D genome structure to predict alternative splicing and polyadenylation

Understanding how the 3D structure of the genome influences gene regulation is a growing area of interest, particularly in the context of alternative post-transcriptional regulatory events such as alternative splicing (AS) and alternative polyadenylation (APA). These processes are essential for generating transcript and protein diversity, and they are tightly coordinated with transcription. However, despite their biological importance, the relationship between chromatin interactions and alternative pre-messenger RNA regulation remains poorly understood. This gap largely stems from a lack of computational tools capable of integrating structural genomic data with RNA processing dynamics. Exploring how chromatin interactions and epigenetic landscapes shape these events is essential for uncovering the multilayered regulation of gene expression. To bridge this gap, we present EpGAT, a graph attention network-based model that integrates epigenetic read coverage and chromatin interaction data to predict and quantify AS and APA events. By explicitly modeling the spatial organization of the genome, EpGAT captures the regulatory influence of chromatin looping and long-range genomic interactions on RNA processing. The model's predictions are validated through rigorous cross-cell line and cross-chromosome evaluations, affirming its generalizability and reliability. Beyond prediction, EpGAT offers interpretability by tracing learned parameters back to genomic features, enabling the identification of active enhancers, mapping promoter-enhancer connectivity, and pinpointing the epigenetic factors most critical to specific RNA processing events. These capabilities make EpGAT a powerful tool for dissecting the complex interplay between genome architecture and transcriptomic regulation. More broadly, it provides a generalizable framework for multiple tasks to study the link between 3D genome organization, epigenetic signals, and RNA processing.