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Gene

NAT2

N-acetyltransferase 2

Summary

Cytogenetic location
8p22
Coordinates
Chromosome 8: 18,391,282–18,401,218 (GRCh38)
Exons
2 exons across 9.9 kb
Protein
290 amino acids
Previous symbols
AAC2
MANE Select transcript
ENST00000286479.4NM_000015.3
Locus type
gene with protein product
  • Very high
  • Confident
  • Low
  • Very low

Reference genomeGRCh38

Positions on gene and variant pages follow this choice, in this browser.

NAT2 and medicines

  • Acetylator status

    Pharmacogenomics

    NAT2 acetylates a family of older drugs. Roughly half of people of European ancestry are slow acetylators, which raises exposure — and with it the chance of isoniazid liver injury or hydralazine-induced lupus.

    • Most relevant if you are treated for tuberculosis (isoniazid) or take hydralazine or sulfasalazine long term.
    • Also relevant to amifampridine (for Lambert-Eaton myasthenic syndrome), where slow acetylators start on the lowest dose.
    • Slow acetylation is common and not a disease — it changes drug exposure, not your health.

    Alleles the report reads

    • *7Decreased function
    • *5Decreased function
    • *4Increased function
    • *6Decreased function

    Results CPIC describes

    • Poor Metabolizer
    • Intermediate Metabolizer
    • Rapid Metabolizer
    • Indeterminate
    MedicineCPIC levelGuideline
    hydralazineANAT2 and Hydralazine
    Show 6 more medicines
    MedicineCPIC levelGuideline
    amifampridineB/C
    amifampridine phosphateB/C
    procainamideB/C
    sulfamethoxazole / trimethoprimB/C
    sulfasalazineB/C
    isoniazidC

    Calls the three slow-defining alleles *5, *6 and *7 against the rapid *4, without phasing — the standard approach for unphased data, and accurate for most people, but rarer NAT2 haplotypes are not assessed.

How NAT2 is laid out

  • Coding sequence
  • Untranslated region
  • Intron
  • Direction of transcription
  • Stretches short reads find hard
Chromosome 8, with a bracket where NAT2 sits. NAT2 and 5 genes near it on chromosome 8, from 17,896,250 to 18,896,249.Chromosome 88p22p23.3p23.2p23.1p22p21.3p21.2p21.1p12p11.23p11.22p11.21p11.1q11.1q11.21q11.22q11.23q12.1q12.2q12.3q13.1q13.2q13.3q21.11q21.12q21.13q21.2q21.3q22.1q22.2q22.3q23.1q23.2q23.3q24.11q24.12q24.13q24.21q24.22q24.23q24.318 Mb18.2 Mb18.4 Mb18.6 Mb18.8 MbFGL1: 17,841,833–17,910,383, reverse strandFGL1PCM1: 17,922,746–18,029,996, forward strandPCM1ASAH1: 18,055,992–18,084,998, reverse strandASAH1NAT1: 18,170,399–18,223,746, forward strandNAT1NAT2: 18,391,282–18,401,218, forward strandNAT2PSD3: 18,527,303–19,084,730, reverse strandPSD3Diagram of NAT2: 2 exons on the forward strand of chromosome 8Exon 1: 18,391,282–18,391,345, 64 basesExon 2: 18,399,998–18,401,218, 1,221 bases125′3′

Exons of the gene's MANE Select transcript (release v1.5), from NCBI and EMBL-EBI, on the GRCh38 reference genome.

Chromosome bands from UCSC's GRCh38 ideogram (2022-10-29).

Nearby genes from Ensembl release 116, on GRCh38.

Exons make up 1.3 kb of the gene's 9.9 kb; 873 of those bases code for the protein.

Where this comes from

  • HGNC: the gene's symbol, name, other symbols and location.
  • MANE Select v1.5, from NCBI and EMBL-EBI: the transcript, its exons and coding sequence.
  • CPIC and PharmGKB: the alleles, results and medicines.
  • The Human Phenotype Ontology, release 2026-09-01: the traits linked to the gene. Find out more at hpo.jax.org.

Cite this page

APA

Dante Labs. (n.d.). NAT2 gene: N-acetyltransferase 2. Retrieved 17 October 2026, from https://dantelabs.com/genes/nat2

Vancouver

Dante Labs. NAT2 gene: N-acetyltransferase 2 [Internet]. [cited 17 October 2026]. Available from: https://dantelabs.com/genes/nat2

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