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|
{
"created_at": "2024-05-31T20:40:14.163893Z",
"data": {
"amplify": false,
"answer": "Several genetic factors influence aging in humans. These include the apolipoprotein E gene (APOE), the forkhead box O3A (FOXO3A) gene in the insulin-IGF1 signaling pathway, and the exonuclease 1 (EXO1) gene. Other genes associated with aging are those involved in pathways such as insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-insulin signaling, regulation of lipoprotein metabolism, the mTOR pathway, and the oxidative stress response. Additionally, genes related to immune response, energy metabolism, signal transduction pathways, and cellular senescence also play a role in aging.",
"context": {
"022c37a3-3ea8-4bb7-9997-98ed87635770": [
{
"document_id": "022c37a3-3ea8-4bb7-9997-98ed87635770",
"text": "\n\nGenomic analysis of longevity offers the potential to illuminate the biology of human aging.Here, using genome-wide association meta-analysis of 606,059 parents' survival, we discover two regions associated with longevity (HLA-DQA1/DRB1 and LPA).We also validate previous suggestions that APOE, CHRNA3/5, CDKN2A/B, SH2B3 and FOXO3A influence longevity.Next we show that giving up smoking, educational attainment, openness to new experience and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels are most positively genetically correlated with lifespan while susceptibility to coronary artery disease (CAD), cigarettes smoked per day, lung cancer, insulin resistance and body fat are most negatively correlated.We suggest that the effect of education on lifespan is principally mediated through smoking while the effect of obesity appears to act via CAD.Using instrumental variables, we suggest that an increase of one body mass index unit reduces lifespan by 7 months while 1 year of education adds 11 months to expected lifespan."
},
{
"document_id": "022c37a3-3ea8-4bb7-9997-98ed87635770",
"text": "\nGenomic analysis of longevity offers the potential to illuminate the biology of human aging.Here, using genome-wide association meta-analysis of 606,059 parents' survival, we discover two regions associated with longevity (HLA-DQA1/DRB1 and LPA).We also validate previous suggestions that APOE, CHRNA3/5, CDKN2A/B, SH2B3 and FOXO3A influence longevity.Next we show that giving up smoking, educational attainment, openness to new experience and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels are most positively genetically correlated with lifespan while susceptibility to coronary artery disease (CAD), cigarettes smoked per day, lung cancer, insulin resistance and body fat are most negatively correlated.We suggest that the effect of education on lifespan is principally mediated through smoking while the effect of obesity appears to act via CAD.Using instrumental variables, we suggest that an increase of one body mass index unit reduces lifespan by 7 months while 1 year of education adds 11 months to expected lifespan."
}
],
"03a4f57c-3a11-4d3d-a1e9-6d0d8bdb7cb7": [
{
"document_id": "03a4f57c-3a11-4d3d-a1e9-6d0d8bdb7cb7",
"text": "\n\nRecent developments on the genetics of aging can be seen as several streams of effort.In general, humans show a relatively modest (<50%) heritability of life spans (results obtained from twin studies discussed below).The apoE polymorphisms are remarkable for their influence on both cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer disease.In contrast, rare mutant genes with high penetrance cause these same diseases but with early onset and a major shortening of the life span.Shortlived laboratory models (fruit flies, nematodes, mice) are yielding rapid advances, with the discovery of mutants that increase life spans in association with altered metabolism, which leads to questions on the physiological organization of aging processes.Although these early findings do not show that a conserved genetic program actually controls aging processes across animal phylogeny, it is striking how frequently findings of metabolic rate, insulin signaling, and free radicals have emerged from very different approaches to aging in nematodes and mammals, for example.These findings hint that the genetic control of life span was already developed in the common ancestor of modern animals so that subsequent evolution of life spans was mediated by quantitative changes in the control of metabolism through insulin and the production of free radicals."
}
],
"04c5378f-40dc-4690-af03-e5205779b881": [
{
"document_id": "04c5378f-40dc-4690-af03-e5205779b881",
"text": "\nBackground: Genetic research on longevity has provided important insights into the mechanism of aging and aging-related diseases.Pinpointing import genetic variants associated with aging could provide insights for aging research.Methods: We performed a whole-genome sequencing in 19 centenarians to establish the genetic basis of human longevity.Results: Using SKAT analysis, we found 41 significantly correlated genes in centenarians as compared to control genomes.Pathway enrichment analysis of these genes showed that immune-related pathways were enriched, suggesting that immune pathways might be critically involved in aging.HLA typing was next performed based on the whole-genome sequencing data obtained.We discovered that several HLA subtypes were significantly overrepresented.Conclusions: Our study indicated a new mechanism of longevity, suggesting potential genetic variants for further study."
},
{
"document_id": "04c5378f-40dc-4690-af03-e5205779b881",
"text": "Introduction\n\nWith the development of human genomics research, a large number of studies of the genetics of longevity have been conducted.Scientists from various countries have proposed many different theories concerning the mechanisms of aging from different perspectives, involving oxidative stress, energy metabolism, signal transduction pathways, immune response, etc. [1,2].These mechanisms interact with each other and are influenced by heredity to some degree [2,3].The identification of longevity-related biological markers is critical to an indepth understanding of the mechanisms of carrier protection against common disease and/or of the retardation of the process of aging."
}
],
"1386c8ad-297d-48b1-aa34-41659a9f6544": [
{
"document_id": "1386c8ad-297d-48b1-aa34-41659a9f6544",
"text": "INTRODUCTION\n\nHuman aging is affected by genes, life style, and environmental factors.The genetic contribution to average human aging can be modest with genes explaining ∼20-25% of the variability of human survival to the mid-eighties (Herskind et al., 1996;Fraser and Shavlik, 2001).By contrast, genetic factors may have greater impact on survival to the ninth through eleventh decades (Tan et al., 2008).Notably, exceptional longevity is rare and may involve biological mechanisms that differ from those implicated in usual human aging."
}
],
"4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54": [
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"text": "\n\nSomatic mutations with the inherited gene variations of each individual cumulatively or synergistically influence the health span and life span [11].Very few genetic variants have been associated with human longevity, but those found include the transcription factor FOXO3 gene, the APOE/TOMM40 and the CDKN2B/ ANRIL loci, which are associated with Alzheimer's disease and cellular senescence [12][13][14].In fact, the heritability for human longevity has been estimated to be approximately 20-30%, according to studies of twins, suggesting that external factors such as diet, environment, physical activity and microbiomes are important factors that influence the health span [14][15][16].The increase in the rate of retrotranscription reflects genome deregulation, creating additional mutations, DNA damage, and other forms of genome instability.For instance, the expression of several families of retrotransposable elements increases with age, as observed in mouse skeletal muscle and human fibroblasts, particularly the long interspersed nuclear element-1 (L1 LINE) [17,18]."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"text": "Influence of Genetic Factors in Ageing and Lifespan\n\nAgeing is defined as the decline of physiological functions in several tissues and organs inducing an increasing probability of death [17].The understanding of genetic factors involved in ageing has been limited due to the complexity of this process and the heterogeneity among individuals and even among tissues [18][19][20].Tissue cells adopt a senescent phenotype as a consequence of multiple intrinsic, extrinsic, and stochastic factors [21].The combination of these genetic factors is related to longevity and healthy ageing [22].Although this decline is somewhat predictable, some individuals show a much slower decline and get to live past the age of 100.Studies in these individuals showed polymorphisms in some genes which are associated with long life, such as APOE and FOXO3.However, these associations have not been consistent across different populations, suggesting that ageing is rather polygenic [23]."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"text": "\n\nBefore the advent of NGS technologies, several scientists were interested in the study of allele variants associated with aging, but they were limited by the lack of aging rate biomarkers.Now with NGS technologies, these biomarkers have been emerged such as the epigenetic clock that is described in the DNA methylation sequencing section of this chapter.In this post-genomic era, different strategies have been developed in order to understand the genetic factors involved in aging [17].One strategy used is the study of aging in extreme longevity groups of people, called centenarians.Centenarians are a group that can reach an age above 100 years and has an incidence of 1 every 10,000 people [18].In a pioneering study using extreme longevity people (308 individuals belonging to 137 sibships showing extreme longevity), genome-wide scan analysis identified a region on chromosome 4 associated with extreme longevity [19] that corresponds to the microsomal transfer protein (MTP) [20], which is associated with abetalipoproteinemia and hypobeta lipoproteinemia in humans [21,22].Another approach to study the genetic factors involved in longevity consists in assessing allele frequencies from people of different ages, looking for those polymorphisms (SNPs) with enhanced allele frequencies in high-longevity individuals.Those alleles with diminished frequencies in aged individuals may be associated with age-related diseases.Using this approximation, an SNP that shifts isoleucine to valine was identified in the PKA-anchoring protein (AKAP2) gene.This polymorphism is associated with reduced longevity and cardiac disease [23].Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have confirmed only three loci that affect longevity: FOXO3A, APOE, and an intergenic locus on chromosome 5q33.3[24][25][26]."
}
],
"7291ceb2-482a-4f9b-a116-2b68ff24854f": [
{
"document_id": "7291ceb2-482a-4f9b-a116-2b68ff24854f",
"text": "\n\nM OST genetic studies involved with aging have focused on identifying genes contributing to particular diseases.More recently, it has been recognized that it is also valuable to examine genetic factors related to diseasefree or healthy aging (1,2).Utilizing twins from the National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council (NAS-NRC) twin panel, we have demonstrated that healthy physical aging is under a significant degree of genetic influence, with a heritability over 50% (3).Our definition of healthy aging focused principally on freedom from cardiovascular disease, and has received considerable support in the more recent literature.Brand and colleagues (4) reported that parental age at death was a significant predictor of coronary heart disease death in the Framingham offspring study and concluded that familial similarities for age at death may be mediated through shared coronary heart disease risk factors.Frederiksen and colleagues (5) reported that increased parental life was associated with a reduction in odds ratio for their children to have diabetes, ischemic heart disease, heart failure, stroke, and hypertension.We have found that better midlife lipid levels and blood pressures were associated with increased parental longevity in the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute twin study (6).Centenarian siblings and offspring, besides having increased longevity, have been shown to have better health and better cardiovascular risk factor profiles (7)(8)(9)(10)."
}
],
"932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89": [
{
"document_id": "932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89",
"text": "Introduction\n\nThe recent, remarkable extension of life expectancy is largely attributed to the postponement of mortality at old age (Vaupel, 1997(Vaupel, , 2010)).The years of life gained in the older population residing in developed nations are a success story of public health measures and improved health care.In addition to such external factors, longevity and healthy aging consistently show a modest heritability between 20% and 50% and aging-associated genetic research may provide further insights into the mechanisms of aging (Herskind et al., 1996;McGue et al., 1993;Reed and Dick, 2003).It has been postulated that genes involved in pathways associated with aging identified in animal models, such as insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-insulin signaling, regulation of lipoprotein metabolism, the mTOR pathway, and the oxidative stress response may also influence survival to old or even exceptionally old age in humans (Christensen et al., 2006;Kenyon, 2010;Vellai et al., 2003).However, in humans, common variants within genes involved in these pathways have not been consistently associated with lifespan (Chris-tensen et al., 2006;Kenyon, 2010;Kuningas et al., 2008;Vijg and Suh, 2005)."
},
{
"document_id": "932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89",
"text": "\n\nHuman longevity and healthy aging show moderate heritability (20%-50%).We conducted a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies from 9 studies from the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology Consortium for 2 outcomes: (1) all-cause mortality, and (2) survival free of major disease or death.No single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) was a genome-wide significant predictor of either outcome (p Ͻ 5 ϫ 10 Ϫ8 ).We found 14 independent SNPs that predicted risk of death, and 8 SNPs that predicted event-free survival (p Ͻ 10 Ϫ5 ).These SNPs are in or near genes that are highly expressed in the brain (HECW2, HIP1, BIN2, GRIA1), genes involved in neural development and function (KCNQ4, LMO4, GRIA1, NETO1) and autophagy (ATG4C), and genes that are associated with risk of various diseases including cancer and Alzheimer's disease.In addition to considerable overlap between the traits, pathway and network analysis corroborated these findings.These findings indicate that variation in genes involved in neurological processes may be an important factor in regulating aging free of major disease and achieving longevity."
}
],
"c8fbb24d-0a72-4a45-a552-6cd98a4a25a2": [
{
"document_id": "c8fbb24d-0a72-4a45-a552-6cd98a4a25a2",
"text": "Translational\n\nA LTHOUGH there is much debate about the processes driving human aging, there is little doubt that genetic influences play a significant role (1).Humans clearly live very much longer than the currently favored laboratory models of aging, and such interspecies differences in reproductively 'fit' life span must have an inherited genetic foundation.Within human populations, environmental and behavioral exposures are important but at least a quarter of life expectancy variation in twin or family studies is attributable to inherited genetic or epigenetic factors (2).Age-related conditions such as type 2 diabetes, myocardial infarction, common cancers, and Alzheimer's disease (AD) typically have onsets after the fourth decade of life; \"successful\" agers delay these onsets until relatively late in life (3).Many aging traits and diseases show moderate heritability, including cardiovascular disease (CVD) (4) and impaired physical functioning (5), independent of known environmental risk factors."
}
],
"ca76f85d-9f72-4e15-8ba9-3bf94308c449": [
{
"document_id": "ca76f85d-9f72-4e15-8ba9-3bf94308c449",
"text": "\n\nMany factors contribute to aging, including genes.This is the first article in a 10-part series that highlight some of what is known about the influence of genes on aging and emerging treatment options that may slow down or potentially reverse the aging process.The series will address \\genes, adducts, and telomeres, decreased immune defenses, oxidation and inefficient mitochondria, toxins and radiation, glycosylation, caloric intake and sirtuin production, neurotransmitter imbalance, hormone mechanisms, reduced nitric oxide, and stem cell slowdown.Underpinning these factors are wear and tear on cells and aging as a result of inability to repair or replace these affected cells.These topics have been addressed in research, health magazines, and even by talk show hosts.There is even a LongevityMap website addressing significant and nonsignificant genetic association studies in aging across the human genome (http://genomics.senescence.info/longevity/).The series will address a scientific and clinical approach to genome-related aging topics."
}
],
"d174ea46-2c88-4047-a333-cb66e483a51f": [
{
"document_id": "d174ea46-2c88-4047-a333-cb66e483a51f",
"text": "\n\nThe genetic basis of human longevity has so far been primarily investigated by association studies.Most results from these experiments have been difficult to confirm in independent samples, probably owing to the modest heritability, multifactorial nature, and heterogeneity of the phenotype (Christensen et al., 2006).To date, variation in only two genes has been identified, which has an effect on longevity in various populations: (i) the apolipoprotein E gene (APOE) (Scha ¨chter et al., 1994;Christensen et al., 2006) and (ii) the forkhead box O3A (FOXO3A) gene in the insulin-IGF1 signaling (IIS) pathway (Willcox et al., 2008;Flachsbart et al., 2009).Given the apparent lack of susceptibility candidates, it is conceivable that other genetic factors influence the function or expression of genes relevant for human longevity."
},
{
"document_id": "d174ea46-2c88-4047-a333-cb66e483a51f",
"text": "Introduction\n\nHuman longevity is influenced by multiple genetic and environmental factors.Approximately 25-32% of the overall variation in adult lifespan is because of genetic variation that becomes particularly important for survival at advanced age (Hjelmborg et al., 2006).Epidemiological studies have revealed that long-lived individuals (LLI), that is, people surviving to the 95th percentile of the respective birth cohort-specific age distributions (Gudmundsson et al., 2000), frequently show a favorable ('healthy') course of the aging process, with the absence or a delayed onset of agerelated diseases (Hitt et al., 1999).Hence, the LLI offer the key to elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying the 'healthy aging' phenotype (Perls, 2006)."
}
],
"db90a971-e55a-4ab0-a3b1-05908d6771a4": [
{
"document_id": "db90a971-e55a-4ab0-a3b1-05908d6771a4",
"text": "Introduction\n\nApproximately 25-30% of the variation in adult lifespan is attributable to genetic factors that become more important with increasing age and exert their strongest effects in nonagenarians and centenarians (Go ¨gele et al., 2010;Hjelmborg et al., 2006).As yet, however, only a few genetic variants have been found consistently to influence longevity.The first to be discovered was the e4 allele of the apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene, a mortality factor that predisposes to both Alzheimer's and cardiovascular diseases (Corder et al., 1993; Panza et al., 2004).APOE e4 is the only variant with a reportedly large adverse effect upon survival at advanced age (Scha ¨chter et al., 1994), and this association has been replicated in several populations (Christensen et al., 2006).Variation in the human forkhead box O3A gene (FOXO3A), in contrast, has been found to be associated with the ability to live long, an effect corroborated by studies in Japanese, German, Italian, US-American, Jewish, Chinese and Danish populations (Anselmi et al., 2009;Flachsbart et al., 2009;Li et al., 2009;Pawlikowska et al., 2009;Soerensen et al., 2010;Willcox et al., 2008).More recently, we have identified exonuclease 1 (EXO1) as a potential novel longevity gene (Nebel et al., 2009).All three genes were detected through candidate-gene approaches."
}
],
"f2b8524b-501d-4ec7-a3d7-048aab67ce05": [
{
"document_id": "f2b8524b-501d-4ec7-a3d7-048aab67ce05",
"text": "GenAge: the aging gene database Philosophy and overview of resources\n\nIt is undisputed that genetic factors influence aging.In a remarkable series of recent breakthroughs, a number of genes capable of altering the aging process as a whole -or at least to a large degree -have been identified in animal models and even a few in humans (Finch & Ruvkun, 2001;de Magalhães, 2005;Kenyon, 2005).Furthermore, multiple alleles have been examined for their association with human exceptional longevity (Vijg & Suh, 2005).This is a fascinating and important area of research, yet there are now so many genes being associated with aging and longevity that keeping track of them all is becoming increasingly more difficult.Moreover, it is necessary now to study not only individual genes but their interactions with each other and with the environment, and how together genes give rise to a given phenotype: the so-called systems biology approach.To help researchers address these issues we created GenAge, a database of genes related to longevity and/or aging."
}
],
"f4e2fa75-559b-4fa9-b722-bdac03f7715a": [
{
"document_id": "f4e2fa75-559b-4fa9-b722-bdac03f7715a",
"text": "\n\nI NCREASES in longevity of the general population world- wide are an unprecedented phenomenon with significant health and social impact.Although environmental factors have led to an increase in life span, there is ample evidence that genetic factors are involved in extreme longevity both in humans (1-7) and in other organisms (8).The protective genetic factors that lead to longevity are likely to involve fundamental processes of aging that may be different from those associated with early mortality or premature onset of age-related diseases in younger individuals.The mechanisms of aging in humans are far from understood, but available evidence suggests that several pathways-inflammation, oxidative stress and stress responses, cellular senescence, DNA damage and repair, and the growth hormone or insulinlike growth factor and insulin (GH, IGF, INS) axis-may play key roles (9)(10)(11)(12).Model organisms suggest that inhibiting the GH, IGF, or INS axis, which is involved in regulating cell proliferation, cell death, wound repair, and metabolism, may promote longevity by reducing oxidative stress and slowing the rate of cell replication and the accumulation of somatic-cell DNA mutations (13).There is also evidence for other important pathways such as the heatshock proteins and heat-shock factors that are highly conserved across species and play a role in prolongevity transcription pathways.Clinical and epidemiological investigations, including candidate gene studies, have suggested that inflammation pathways may affect life span and risk of age-related conditions such as cardiovascular disease (CVD) and its risk factors (14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19).A combination of multiple genetic variants may be required for an individual to achieve exceptional longevity, which may account in part for its rarity."
}
],
"f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068": [
{
"document_id": "f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068",
"text": "\n\nHuman lifespan variation is mainly determined by environmental factors, whereas the genetic contribution is 25-30% and expected to be polygenic.Two complementary fields go hand in hand in order to unravel the mechanisms of biological aging: genomic and biomarker research.Explorative and candidate gene studies of the human genome by genetic, transcriptomic, and epigenomic approaches have resulted in the identification of a limited number of interesting positive linkage regions, genes, and pathways that contribute to lifespan variation.The possibilities to further exploit these findings are rapidly increasing through the use of novel technologies, such as next-generation sequencing.Genomic research is progressively being integrated with biomarker studies on aging, including the application of (noninvasive) deep phenotyping and omics data -generated using novel technologies -in a wealth of studies in human populations.Hence, these studies may assist in obtaining a more holistic perspective on the role of the genome in aging and lifespan regulation."
}
]
},
"data_source": [
{
"document_id": "1386c8ad-297d-48b1-aa34-41659a9f6544",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "INTRODUCTION\n\nHuman aging is affected by genes, life style, and environmental factors.The genetic contribution to average human aging can be modest with genes explaining ∼20-25% of the variability of human survival to the mid-eighties (Herskind et al., 1996;Fraser and Shavlik, 2001).By contrast, genetic factors may have greater impact on survival to the ninth through eleventh decades (Tan et al., 2008).Notably, exceptional longevity is rare and may involve biological mechanisms that differ from those implicated in usual human aging."
},
{
"document_id": "f2b8524b-501d-4ec7-a3d7-048aab67ce05",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "GenAge: the aging gene database Philosophy and overview of resources\n\nIt is undisputed that genetic factors influence aging.In a remarkable series of recent breakthroughs, a number of genes capable of altering the aging process as a whole -or at least to a large degree -have been identified in animal models and even a few in humans (Finch & Ruvkun, 2001;de Magalhães, 2005;Kenyon, 2005).Furthermore, multiple alleles have been examined for their association with human exceptional longevity (Vijg & Suh, 2005).This is a fascinating and important area of research, yet there are now so many genes being associated with aging and longevity that keeping track of them all is becoming increasingly more difficult.Moreover, it is necessary now to study not only individual genes but their interactions with each other and with the environment, and how together genes give rise to a given phenotype: the so-called systems biology approach.To help researchers address these issues we created GenAge, a database of genes related to longevity and/or aging."
},
{
"document_id": "c8fbb24d-0a72-4a45-a552-6cd98a4a25a2",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Translational\n\nA LTHOUGH there is much debate about the processes driving human aging, there is little doubt that genetic influences play a significant role (1).Humans clearly live very much longer than the currently favored laboratory models of aging, and such interspecies differences in reproductively 'fit' life span must have an inherited genetic foundation.Within human populations, environmental and behavioral exposures are important but at least a quarter of life expectancy variation in twin or family studies is attributable to inherited genetic or epigenetic factors (2).Age-related conditions such as type 2 diabetes, myocardial infarction, common cancers, and Alzheimer's disease (AD) typically have onsets after the fourth decade of life; \"successful\" agers delay these onsets until relatively late in life (3).Many aging traits and diseases show moderate heritability, including cardiovascular disease (CVD) (4) and impaired physical functioning (5), independent of known environmental risk factors."
},
{
"document_id": "d174ea46-2c88-4047-a333-cb66e483a51f",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nThe genetic basis of human longevity has so far been primarily investigated by association studies.Most results from these experiments have been difficult to confirm in independent samples, probably owing to the modest heritability, multifactorial nature, and heterogeneity of the phenotype (Christensen et al., 2006).To date, variation in only two genes has been identified, which has an effect on longevity in various populations: (i) the apolipoprotein E gene (APOE) (Scha ¨chter et al., 1994;Christensen et al., 2006) and (ii) the forkhead box O3A (FOXO3A) gene in the insulin-IGF1 signaling (IIS) pathway (Willcox et al., 2008;Flachsbart et al., 2009).Given the apparent lack of susceptibility candidates, it is conceivable that other genetic factors influence the function or expression of genes relevant for human longevity."
},
{
"document_id": "04c5378f-40dc-4690-af03-e5205779b881",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Introduction\n\nWith the development of human genomics research, a large number of studies of the genetics of longevity have been conducted.Scientists from various countries have proposed many different theories concerning the mechanisms of aging from different perspectives, involving oxidative stress, energy metabolism, signal transduction pathways, immune response, etc. [1,2].These mechanisms interact with each other and are influenced by heredity to some degree [2,3].The identification of longevity-related biological markers is critical to an indepth understanding of the mechanisms of carrier protection against common disease and/or of the retardation of the process of aging."
},
{
"document_id": "ca76f85d-9f72-4e15-8ba9-3bf94308c449",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nMany factors contribute to aging, including genes.This is the first article in a 10-part series that highlight some of what is known about the influence of genes on aging and emerging treatment options that may slow down or potentially reverse the aging process.The series will address \\genes, adducts, and telomeres, decreased immune defenses, oxidation and inefficient mitochondria, toxins and radiation, glycosylation, caloric intake and sirtuin production, neurotransmitter imbalance, hormone mechanisms, reduced nitric oxide, and stem cell slowdown.Underpinning these factors are wear and tear on cells and aging as a result of inability to repair or replace these affected cells.These topics have been addressed in research, health magazines, and even by talk show hosts.There is even a LongevityMap website addressing significant and nonsignificant genetic association studies in aging across the human genome (http://genomics.senescence.info/longevity/).The series will address a scientific and clinical approach to genome-related aging topics."
},
{
"document_id": "f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068",
"section_type": "abstract",
"text": "\nHuman lifespan variation is mainly determined by environmental factors, whereas the genetic contribution is 25-30% and expected to be polygenic.Two complementary fields go hand in hand in order to unravel the mechanisms of biological aging: genomic and biomarker research.Explorative and candidate gene studies of the human genome by genetic, transcriptomic, and epigenomic approaches have resulted in the identification of a limited number of interesting positive linkage regions, genes, and pathways that contribute to lifespan variation.The possibilities to further exploit these findings are rapidly increasing through the use of novel technologies, such as next-generation sequencing.Genomic research is progressively being integrated with biomarker studies on aging, including the application of (noninvasive) deep phenotyping and omics data -generated using novel technologies -in a wealth of studies in human populations.Hence, these studies may assist in obtaining a more holistic perspective on the role of the genome in aging and lifespan regulation."
},
{
"document_id": "f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nHuman lifespan variation is mainly determined by environmental factors, whereas the genetic contribution is 25-30% and expected to be polygenic.Two complementary fields go hand in hand in order to unravel the mechanisms of biological aging: genomic and biomarker research.Explorative and candidate gene studies of the human genome by genetic, transcriptomic, and epigenomic approaches have resulted in the identification of a limited number of interesting positive linkage regions, genes, and pathways that contribute to lifespan variation.The possibilities to further exploit these findings are rapidly increasing through the use of novel technologies, such as next-generation sequencing.Genomic research is progressively being integrated with biomarker studies on aging, including the application of (noninvasive) deep phenotyping and omics data -generated using novel technologies -in a wealth of studies in human populations.Hence, these studies may assist in obtaining a more holistic perspective on the role of the genome in aging and lifespan regulation."
},
{
"document_id": "555a1533-2905-4d91-a3b6-2fca3679ab02",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nEven more disappointing result is that some genes predisposing to geriatric diseases discovered by GWAS appear to be not correlated with human longevity (Beekman et al. 2010;Deelen et al. 2011).This result questions whether findings obtained from GWAS may provide insights into the bio-genetic mechanisms underlying a healthy lifespan.In fact, this finding is very surprising because (1) genetic studies of non-human species have discovered numerous genes predisposing to aging-related processes (Cutler and Mattson 2006;Vijg and Suh 2005;Kenyon 2005;Johnson 2006;Greer and Brunet 2008), (2) nongenetic association studies show that the long-living individuals are typically in better health compared to the short-living individuals (Barzilai et al. 2003;Willcox et al. 2008b;Willcox et al. 2008a;Evert et al. 2003), and (3) candidate-gene studies (but not GWAS) document that the same genes can affect diseases and lifespan (Koropatnick et al. 2008;Kulminski et al. 2011).This is an apparent paradox which has to be carefully examined.A prominent geneticist and evolutionary biologist T. G. Dobzhansky asserts that \"nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution. \"Evolution primarily maximizes fitness of individuals of reproductive age.The classical evolutionary biological theory of aging claims that aging occurs because of decline in the force of natural selection with age (Kirkwood and Austad 2000).Then, according to that theory, aging-related (senescent) phenotypes with post-reproductive manifestation are non-adaptive and subject to stochastic variation.Therefore, at a first glance evolution should not be relevant to senescent phenotypes (apart so-called grandmother hypothesis; Hawkes et al. 1998).Such phenotypes, however, can be caused by reproductive-age-related risk factors making, thus, evolution to be relevant to them (Vijg and Suh 2005;Di Rienzo and Hudson 2005;Drenos and Kirkwood 2010)."
},
{
"document_id": "f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Conclusions and prospects\n\nOver the past two decades the human aging field has built up the necessary resources to study the biology of aging and longevity by establishing human populations with a diversity of designs.Meta-analyses integrating genetic and phenotypic datasets have successfully identified variants associated with a range of age-related traits and diseases.Despite these accomplishments, the number of novel leads contributing to human lifespan regulation is limited.Although positive regions of linkage and suggestive GWAS hits have been reported, the field has not yet identified the loci that explain the clustering of longevity in families and the variation in biological aging rate in the population.As for animal models, down-signaling of the IIS and mTOR pathway appeared to be relevant in humans.These findings are being followed up by molecular and physiological profiling using skin, fat and muscle tissue of long-lived family members and controls.Human studies now also include the response of nutrient sensing systems to the application of dietary and physical challenges."
},
{
"document_id": "555a1533-2905-4d91-a3b6-2fca3679ab02",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nInvolvement of genes in a wide range of fundamental biological processes suggests also a broad role of these genes in regulating the aging-related phenotypes."
},
{
"document_id": "555a1533-2905-4d91-a3b6-2fca3679ab02",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nAging is an extremely complex process associated with interplay of genetic, biochemical, and metabolic factors in an organism in a given environment.Although genetic studies of various animal models suggest that even a single-gene mutation can remarkably extend lifespan (Kenyon 2005;Johnson 2006) and, thus, modulate aging, no such genes are revealed in humans so far.Given that a human organism is a much more complex system than a model organism (Christensen et al. 2006), it is evident that genetic effects on the aging process should be mediated via coordinate action of a large number of inter-related processes (Kirkwood 2011).Coordinated function is rather relevant to complex biological (Soltow et al. 2010;Slagboom et al. 2011) and genetic (Bloss et al. 2011) networks than to individual genes."
},
{
"document_id": "932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nThe lack of success in the identification of genes related to aging in humans may be due to the complexity of the phenotype.One approach to investigate aging and longevity is to compare frequencies of genetic variants between nonagenarians or centenarians and the general population.This approach led to the discovery of an association between APOE (Deelen et al., 2011;Ewbank, 2007;Gerdes et al., 2000) and more recently FOXO3A (Anselmi et al., 2009;Flachsbart et al., 2009;Li et al., 2009a;Pawlikowska et al., 2009;Willcox et al., 2008) and human aging and longevity.However, a recent genome-wide association study (GWAS) of individuals reaching the age of 90 or older failed to identify genome-wide significant variants (Newman et al., 2010)."
},
{
"document_id": "f4e2fa75-559b-4fa9-b722-bdac03f7715a",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nI NCREASES in longevity of the general population world- wide are an unprecedented phenomenon with significant health and social impact.Although environmental factors have led to an increase in life span, there is ample evidence that genetic factors are involved in extreme longevity both in humans (1-7) and in other organisms (8).The protective genetic factors that lead to longevity are likely to involve fundamental processes of aging that may be different from those associated with early mortality or premature onset of age-related diseases in younger individuals.The mechanisms of aging in humans are far from understood, but available evidence suggests that several pathways-inflammation, oxidative stress and stress responses, cellular senescence, DNA damage and repair, and the growth hormone or insulinlike growth factor and insulin (GH, IGF, INS) axis-may play key roles (9)(10)(11)(12).Model organisms suggest that inhibiting the GH, IGF, or INS axis, which is involved in regulating cell proliferation, cell death, wound repair, and metabolism, may promote longevity by reducing oxidative stress and slowing the rate of cell replication and the accumulation of somatic-cell DNA mutations (13).There is also evidence for other important pathways such as the heatshock proteins and heat-shock factors that are highly conserved across species and play a role in prolongevity transcription pathways.Clinical and epidemiological investigations, including candidate gene studies, have suggested that inflammation pathways may affect life span and risk of age-related conditions such as cardiovascular disease (CVD) and its risk factors (14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19).A combination of multiple genetic variants may be required for an individual to achieve exceptional longevity, which may account in part for its rarity."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nSomatic mutations with the inherited gene variations of each individual cumulatively or synergistically influence the health span and life span [11].Very few genetic variants have been associated with human longevity, but those found include the transcription factor FOXO3 gene, the APOE/TOMM40 and the CDKN2B/ ANRIL loci, which are associated with Alzheimer's disease and cellular senescence [12][13][14].In fact, the heritability for human longevity has been estimated to be approximately 20-30%, according to studies of twins, suggesting that external factors such as diet, environment, physical activity and microbiomes are important factors that influence the health span [14][15][16].The increase in the rate of retrotranscription reflects genome deregulation, creating additional mutations, DNA damage, and other forms of genome instability.For instance, the expression of several families of retrotransposable elements increases with age, as observed in mouse skeletal muscle and human fibroblasts, particularly the long interspersed nuclear element-1 (L1 LINE) [17,18]."
},
{
"document_id": "022c37a3-3ea8-4bb7-9997-98ed87635770",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nGenomic analysis of longevity offers the potential to illuminate the biology of human aging.Here, using genome-wide association meta-analysis of 606,059 parents' survival, we discover two regions associated with longevity (HLA-DQA1/DRB1 and LPA).We also validate previous suggestions that APOE, CHRNA3/5, CDKN2A/B, SH2B3 and FOXO3A influence longevity.Next we show that giving up smoking, educational attainment, openness to new experience and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels are most positively genetically correlated with lifespan while susceptibility to coronary artery disease (CAD), cigarettes smoked per day, lung cancer, insulin resistance and body fat are most negatively correlated.We suggest that the effect of education on lifespan is principally mediated through smoking while the effect of obesity appears to act via CAD.Using instrumental variables, we suggest that an increase of one body mass index unit reduces lifespan by 7 months while 1 year of education adds 11 months to expected lifespan."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Conclusions and Perspectives\n\nThe advent of new technologies has allowed the identification of conserved pathways involved in the aging process, as well as the association of genomic variants with human longevity.Nevertheless, heritability of human longevity has been estimated from 20% to 30%, reinforcing the fact that external factors such as diet, environment, and physical activity play a critical role in the human life span."
},
{
"document_id": "022c37a3-3ea8-4bb7-9997-98ed87635770",
"section_type": "abstract",
"text": "\nGenomic analysis of longevity offers the potential to illuminate the biology of human aging.Here, using genome-wide association meta-analysis of 606,059 parents' survival, we discover two regions associated with longevity (HLA-DQA1/DRB1 and LPA).We also validate previous suggestions that APOE, CHRNA3/5, CDKN2A/B, SH2B3 and FOXO3A influence longevity.Next we show that giving up smoking, educational attainment, openness to new experience and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels are most positively genetically correlated with lifespan while susceptibility to coronary artery disease (CAD), cigarettes smoked per day, lung cancer, insulin resistance and body fat are most negatively correlated.We suggest that the effect of education on lifespan is principally mediated through smoking while the effect of obesity appears to act via CAD.Using instrumental variables, we suggest that an increase of one body mass index unit reduces lifespan by 7 months while 1 year of education adds 11 months to expected lifespan."
},
{
"document_id": "d174ea46-2c88-4047-a333-cb66e483a51f",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Introduction\n\nHuman longevity is influenced by multiple genetic and environmental factors.Approximately 25-32% of the overall variation in adult lifespan is because of genetic variation that becomes particularly important for survival at advanced age (Hjelmborg et al., 2006).Epidemiological studies have revealed that long-lived individuals (LLI), that is, people surviving to the 95th percentile of the respective birth cohort-specific age distributions (Gudmundsson et al., 2000), frequently show a favorable ('healthy') course of the aging process, with the absence or a delayed onset of agerelated diseases (Hitt et al., 1999).Hence, the LLI offer the key to elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying the 'healthy aging' phenotype (Perls, 2006)."
},
{
"document_id": "78a43a45-84b0-4d73-9396-95b99cfd3983",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nMany factors beside genetics influence how long a person will live and our lifespan cannot be read from our DNA alone.Nevertheless, Timmers et al. had hoped to narrow down their search and discover specific genes that directly influence how quickly people age, beyond diseases.If such genes exist, their effects were too small to be detected in this study.The next step will be to expand the study to include more participants, which will hopefully pinpoint further genomic regions and help disentangle the biology of ageing and disease."
},
{
"document_id": "04c5378f-40dc-4690-af03-e5205779b881",
"section_type": "abstract",
"text": "\nBackground: Genetic research on longevity has provided important insights into the mechanism of aging and aging-related diseases.Pinpointing import genetic variants associated with aging could provide insights for aging research.Methods: We performed a whole-genome sequencing in 19 centenarians to establish the genetic basis of human longevity.Results: Using SKAT analysis, we found 41 significantly correlated genes in centenarians as compared to control genomes.Pathway enrichment analysis of these genes showed that immune-related pathways were enriched, suggesting that immune pathways might be critically involved in aging.HLA typing was next performed based on the whole-genome sequencing data obtained.We discovered that several HLA subtypes were significantly overrepresented.Conclusions: Our study indicated a new mechanism of longevity, suggesting potential genetic variants for further study."
},
{
"document_id": "7291ceb2-482a-4f9b-a116-2b68ff24854f",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nM OST genetic studies involved with aging have focused on identifying genes contributing to particular diseases.More recently, it has been recognized that it is also valuable to examine genetic factors related to diseasefree or healthy aging (1,2).Utilizing twins from the National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council (NAS-NRC) twin panel, we have demonstrated that healthy physical aging is under a significant degree of genetic influence, with a heritability over 50% (3).Our definition of healthy aging focused principally on freedom from cardiovascular disease, and has received considerable support in the more recent literature.Brand and colleagues (4) reported that parental age at death was a significant predictor of coronary heart disease death in the Framingham offspring study and concluded that familial similarities for age at death may be mediated through shared coronary heart disease risk factors.Frederiksen and colleagues (5) reported that increased parental life was associated with a reduction in odds ratio for their children to have diabetes, ischemic heart disease, heart failure, stroke, and hypertension.We have found that better midlife lipid levels and blood pressures were associated with increased parental longevity in the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute twin study (6).Centenarian siblings and offspring, besides having increased longevity, have been shown to have better health and better cardiovascular risk factor profiles (7)(8)(9)(10)."
},
{
"document_id": "555a1533-2905-4d91-a3b6-2fca3679ab02",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nOn the other hand, the same evolutionary-motivated strategy suggesting to focus on more heterogeneous phenotypes (as opposite to more homogenous) can be highly beneficial for unraveling genetic predisposition to fundamental mechanisms of intrinsic biological aging and, consequently, to geriatric diseases.Indeed, aging is associated with systemic remodeling of an organism's functioning which increases chances of virtually all geriatric disorders (Franco et al. 2009;Franceschi et al. 2000;Martin et al. 2007;Cutler and Mattson 2006).Experiments with laboratory animals (Johnson 2006) and heritability estimates in humans (Christensen et al. 2006;Iachine et al. 1998) show that aging can be genetically regulated (Finch and Tanzi 1997;Martin et al. 2007;Vaupel 2010).Accordingly, yielding insights in genetic predisposition to aging-related processes in an organism could be a major breakthrough in preventing and/or ameliorating not one geriatric trait, but perhaps a major subset of such traits (Martin et al. 2007) that can greatly advance progress in solving the problem of extending healthy lifespan in humans."
},
{
"document_id": "03a4f57c-3a11-4d3d-a1e9-6d0d8bdb7cb7",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nRecent developments on the genetics of aging can be seen as several streams of effort.In general, humans show a relatively modest (<50%) heritability of life spans (results obtained from twin studies discussed below).The apoE polymorphisms are remarkable for their influence on both cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer disease.In contrast, rare mutant genes with high penetrance cause these same diseases but with early onset and a major shortening of the life span.Shortlived laboratory models (fruit flies, nematodes, mice) are yielding rapid advances, with the discovery of mutants that increase life spans in association with altered metabolism, which leads to questions on the physiological organization of aging processes.Although these early findings do not show that a conserved genetic program actually controls aging processes across animal phylogeny, it is striking how frequently findings of metabolic rate, insulin signaling, and free radicals have emerged from very different approaches to aging in nematodes and mammals, for example.These findings hint that the genetic control of life span was already developed in the common ancestor of modern animals so that subsequent evolution of life spans was mediated by quantitative changes in the control of metabolism through insulin and the production of free radicals."
},
{
"document_id": "a6bc2efd-61a7-4e07-ad5c-49234aa89431",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nIn 2021, Science published a special issue entitled \"125 Questions: Exploration and Discovery.\" One of these 125 questions was \"Can we stop ourselves from aging? \"The U.S. National Institute on Aging (NIA) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) states that \"aging is associated with changes in dynamic biological, physiological, environmental, psychological, behavioral, and social processes.\" Although geneticists and epidemiologists have long debated the relative importance of the role played by genotype or the environment in the development of age-related diseases, it is apparent that both can play substantial roles in this process [6,7].However, most etiological studies have concentrated on the role of genotype and have considered the environment to play a secondary role.Nevertheless, an analysis of GBD data showed that nearly 50% of deaths worldwide are attributable to environmental exposure, primarily exposure to airborne particulates (including household air pollution and occupational exposure; 14% of all deaths), smoking and secondhand smoke (13%), plasma sodium concentrations (6%), and alcohol consumption (5%) [8].In contrast, a recent analysis of 28 chronic diseases in identical twins showed that the genetic-related risks of developing one of five age-related diseases were 33.3%, 10.6%, 36.3%, 19.5%, and 33.9% for AD, PD, CAD, COPD, and T2DM, respectively, with a mean of only 26% [9].The results of over 400 genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have also elucidated that the heritability of degenerative diseases is only approximately 10% [10,11].Consequently, nongenetic drivers, such as environmental factors, are now recognized as major risk factors for age-related diseases.The contributions of environmental factors to the development of age-related diseases can be revealed by analyses of all of the factors to which individuals are exposed in their life and the relationships between these exposures and age-related diseases [12,13]."
},
{
"document_id": "932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Introduction\n\nThe recent, remarkable extension of life expectancy is largely attributed to the postponement of mortality at old age (Vaupel, 1997(Vaupel, , 2010)).The years of life gained in the older population residing in developed nations are a success story of public health measures and improved health care.In addition to such external factors, longevity and healthy aging consistently show a modest heritability between 20% and 50% and aging-associated genetic research may provide further insights into the mechanisms of aging (Herskind et al., 1996;McGue et al., 1993;Reed and Dick, 2003).It has been postulated that genes involved in pathways associated with aging identified in animal models, such as insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-insulin signaling, regulation of lipoprotein metabolism, the mTOR pathway, and the oxidative stress response may also influence survival to old or even exceptionally old age in humans (Christensen et al., 2006;Kenyon, 2010;Vellai et al., 2003).However, in humans, common variants within genes involved in these pathways have not been consistently associated with lifespan (Chris-tensen et al., 2006;Kenyon, 2010;Kuningas et al., 2008;Vijg and Suh, 2005)."
},
{
"document_id": "db90a971-e55a-4ab0-a3b1-05908d6771a4",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Introduction\n\nApproximately 25-30% of the variation in adult lifespan is attributable to genetic factors that become more important with increasing age and exert their strongest effects in nonagenarians and centenarians (Go ¨gele et al., 2010;Hjelmborg et al., 2006).As yet, however, only a few genetic variants have been found consistently to influence longevity.The first to be discovered was the e4 allele of the apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene, a mortality factor that predisposes to both Alzheimer's and cardiovascular diseases (Corder et al., 1993; Panza et al., 2004).APOE e4 is the only variant with a reportedly large adverse effect upon survival at advanced age (Scha ¨chter et al., 1994), and this association has been replicated in several populations (Christensen et al., 2006).Variation in the human forkhead box O3A gene (FOXO3A), in contrast, has been found to be associated with the ability to live long, an effect corroborated by studies in Japanese, German, Italian, US-American, Jewish, Chinese and Danish populations (Anselmi et al., 2009;Flachsbart et al., 2009;Li et al., 2009;Pawlikowska et al., 2009;Soerensen et al., 2010;Willcox et al., 2008).More recently, we have identified exonuclease 1 (EXO1) as a potential novel longevity gene (Nebel et al., 2009).All three genes were detected through candidate-gene approaches."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Influence of Genetic Factors in Ageing and Lifespan\n\nAgeing is defined as the decline of physiological functions in several tissues and organs inducing an increasing probability of death [17].The understanding of genetic factors involved in ageing has been limited due to the complexity of this process and the heterogeneity among individuals and even among tissues [18][19][20].Tissue cells adopt a senescent phenotype as a consequence of multiple intrinsic, extrinsic, and stochastic factors [21].The combination of these genetic factors is related to longevity and healthy ageing [22].Although this decline is somewhat predictable, some individuals show a much slower decline and get to live past the age of 100.Studies in these individuals showed polymorphisms in some genes which are associated with long life, such as APOE and FOXO3.However, these associations have not been consistent across different populations, suggesting that ageing is rather polygenic [23]."
},
{
"document_id": "ea036684-619d-4b82-9242-c0b220f2d8df",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "The mechanisms that underlie healthy aging—particularly, the cognitive as-\n\npects—remain poorly understood. Research suggests that genetics play a significant role in determining an individual’s\nsusceptibility or resilience to cognitive decline and dementia\n(Harris and Deary 2011; Ridge et al. , 2013). Identification of precise genetic factors involved would provide insight into\n\nCell Reports 32, 108091, September 1, 2020 ª 2020 The Author(s). 1\nThis is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).\n ll\nOPEN ACCESS\n\nReport\n\nFigure 1."
},
{
"document_id": "18e216d9-ea5c-4dfe-a30d-632163fcf39e",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "Current progress and problems of genetic studies of aging and longevity\n\nIn spite of aging being a risk factor for many diseases, a phenotype of aging to date is still tabula rasa.Yet, the choice of a phenotype is critical for the study of a complex genetic process, such as aging (Melzer et al. 2007).Furthermore, proposed treatments to delay or alleviate aging require that validated outcomes exist, which can be measurable earlier rather than later in the life (thus, longevity per se is impractical).To date, however, most of the twin and family studies focused on broad survival measures, primarily on age at death or survival to some arbitrary advanced age (Nicholas et al. 1994).Thus, it has been demonstrated that longevity has moderate heritability ðh 2 ¼ 0:20 À À0:30Þ (McGue et al. 1993;Herskind et al. 1996;Gillespie et al. 1998).There are several challenges in using longevity as a phenotype (reviewed in Karasik et al. 2005 and below).A better strategy would be to investigate a broader outcome such as \"successful\" or \"healthy\" aging (Mulsant et al. 1994;Seeman et al. 2004).However, there is no consensus definition for the latter categories, especially for a genetic study.Similarly, at present, there is no consensus about how to measure aging starting in midlife despite a plethora of publications on the biomarkers and risk factors of aging (Newman et al. 2008).Yet, researchers (Nilsson et al. 2003;Crabtree et al. 2002;Vaillant and Mukamal 2001) have argued that studies of aging genetics should be initiated earlier in life, when there are life expectations permissive of longitudinal studies as well as information on environmental exposures traceable to the outcomes."
},
{
"document_id": "f6bde053-64e5-42d9-966d-9d5d5d82a068",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nStudies of mono-and dizygous twins have revealed that the genetic contribution to the variation in human lifespan is about 25-30% [12,13], and is most prominent in families clustered for longevity [14,15].This genetic contribution is mainly apparent after the age of 60 years and seems to increase with age [13,16].Furthermore, human lifespan is a complex trait which is assumed to be determined by many genes with small individual effects [17], although the polygenic architecture still needs to be characterized [18,19].The diverse health features of long-lived families illustrate that different age-related diseases have common determinants and implicate that pathways can be identified that attenuate aging and delay age-related disease.From a genomic perspective, individuals from long-lived families are assumed to be characterized by a decreased prevalence of disease-promoting variants (referred to as disease-susceptibility alleles) and an increased prevalence of variants conferring maintenance of health and protection from disease, when compared to population controls.In the last 5 years, many diseasesusceptibility alleles have been identified (National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) genome-wide association study (GWAS) Catalog; http://www.genome.gov/gwastudies/)[20].A first comparison between long-lived individuals, selected from both long-lived families (LLS) and the general population (Leiden 85-plus study), and young controls showed no difference in the distribution or frequency of disease-susceptibility alleles identified in cancer, coronary artery disease and type 2 diabetes [21].The search for lifespan regulating loci -contributing to longevity and population mortality -must therefore extend beyond a focus on disease-susceptibility alleles.We will first discuss the efforts to identify longevity loci by genetics approaches."
},
{
"document_id": "a95e6806-06d3-4775-8287-fda4cf6ac42f",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nIn this review, we give an overview of the major environmental factors that modulate aging in animals, in particular those with underlying gene-environment interactions with potential for improving human health and drug discovery.Moreover, we provide a snapshot of the relevance of these to human biology and to antiaging applications in diet, industry, pharmacy, and healthcare."
},
{
"document_id": "aff67cef-4bf7-42dc-826b-2a259722008d",
"section_type": "abstract",
"text": "\nAs our society is growing older, the consequences of aging have begun to gain particular attention.Improvement of quality of life at old age and prevention of age-associated diseases have become the main focus of the aging research.The process of aging in humans is complex and underlies multiple influences, with the probable involvement of heritable and various environmental factors.In particular, hormones are decisively involved in the generation of aging.Over time, important circulating hormones decline due to a reduced secretion of the pituitary, the adrenal glands and the gonads or due to an intercurrent disease.Among them, serum levels of growth factors and sexual steroids show significant aging-associated changes.Within the scope of the Explorative Project 'Genetic aetiology of human longevity' supported by the German National Genome Research Network 2 (NGFN-2) an in vitro model of human hormonal aging has been developed.Human SZ95 sebocytes were maintained under a hormone-substituted environment consisting of growth factors and sexual steroids in concentrations corresponding to those circulating in 20-and in 60-year-old women.Eight hundred and ninety-nine genes showed a differential expression in SZ95 sebocytes maintained under the 20-and 60-year-old hormone mixture, respectively.Among them genes were regulated which are involved in biological processes which are all hallmarks of aging.The most significantly altered signaling pathway identified was that of the transforming growth factor-b (TGF-b).A disturbed function of this cascade has been associated with tumorigenesis, i.e. in pancreatic, prostate, intestine, breast, and uterine cancer.Interestingly, genes expressed in signaling pathways operative in age-associated diseases such as Huntington's disease (HD), dentatorubral-pallidoluysian atrophy (DRPLA), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) were also identified.These data demonstrate that skin and its appendages may represent an adequate model for aging research.Hormones interact in a complex fashion, and aging may be partly attributed to the changes in their circulating blood levels.Furthermore, a disturbed hormone status may partially act towards the manifestation of neurodegenerative diseases.Thus, these results could be a basis for an integrated and interdisciplinary approach to the analysis of the aging process."
},
{
"document_id": "ce2c68bf-878d-460c-8d9b-d45ce3034ef7",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "[PubMed: 18208581]\n3. de Magalhães JP, Wuttke D, Wood SH, Plank M & Vora C Genome-environment interactions that\nmodulate aging: Powerful targets for drug discovery. Pharmacol. Rev. 64, 88–101 (2012). [PubMed:\n22090473]\n4. McDaid AFet al.Bayesian association scan reveals loci associated with human lifespan and linked\nbiomarkers. Nat. Commun. 8, 15842 (2017). [PubMed: 28748955]\n5. Fontana L & Partridge L Promoting health and longevity through diet: From model organisms to\nhumans. Cell 161, 106–118 (2015). [PubMed: 25815989]\n6."
},
{
"document_id": "0fc75a0d-3aa3-481a-8c0f-689bd7ae6104",
"section_type": "abstract",
"text": "\nAging is a complex process affecting different species and individuals in different ways.Comparing genetic variation across species with their aging phenotypes will help understanding the molecular basis of aging and longevity.Although most studies on aging have so far focused on short-lived model organisms, recent comparisons of genomic, transcriptomic, and metabolomic data across lineages with different lifespans are unveiling molecular signatures associated with longevity.Here, we examine the relationship between genomic variation and maximum lifespan across primate species.We used two different approaches.First, we searched for parallel amino-acid mutations that co-occur with increases in longevity across the primate linage.Twenty-five such amino-acid variants were identified, several of which have been previously reported by studies with different experimental setups and in different model organisms.The genes harboring these mutations are mainly enriched in functional categories such as wound healing, blood coagulation, and cardiovascular disorders.We demonstrate that these pathways are highly enriched for pleiotropic effects, as predicted by the antagonistic pleiotropy theory of aging.A second approach was focused on changes in rates of protein evolution across the primate phylogeny.Using the phylogenetic generalized least squares, we show that some genes exhibit strong correlations between their evolutionary rates and longevity-associated traits.These include genes in the Sphingosine 1-phosphate pathway, PI3K signaling, and the Thrombin/protease-activated receptor pathway, among other cardiovascular processes.Together, these results shed light into human senescence patterns and underscore the power of comparative genomics to identify pathways related to aging and longevity."
},
{
"document_id": "4a27da1c-b184-47e8-bef2-de6435d7c3f5",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nAdditional association studies with these families and replication of these results with an independent data set should facilitate the positional cloning of a gene that influences the ability to age well and achieve exceptional longevity.Identification of the genes in humans that allow certain individuals to live to extreme old age should lead to insights on cellular pathways that are important to the aging process."
},
{
"document_id": "4f709611-ea0b-4bcc-a634-df5d518ccb54",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nBefore the advent of NGS technologies, several scientists were interested in the study of allele variants associated with aging, but they were limited by the lack of aging rate biomarkers.Now with NGS technologies, these biomarkers have been emerged such as the epigenetic clock that is described in the DNA methylation sequencing section of this chapter.In this post-genomic era, different strategies have been developed in order to understand the genetic factors involved in aging [17].One strategy used is the study of aging in extreme longevity groups of people, called centenarians.Centenarians are a group that can reach an age above 100 years and has an incidence of 1 every 10,000 people [18].In a pioneering study using extreme longevity people (308 individuals belonging to 137 sibships showing extreme longevity), genome-wide scan analysis identified a region on chromosome 4 associated with extreme longevity [19] that corresponds to the microsomal transfer protein (MTP) [20], which is associated with abetalipoproteinemia and hypobeta lipoproteinemia in humans [21,22].Another approach to study the genetic factors involved in longevity consists in assessing allele frequencies from people of different ages, looking for those polymorphisms (SNPs) with enhanced allele frequencies in high-longevity individuals.Those alleles with diminished frequencies in aged individuals may be associated with age-related diseases.Using this approximation, an SNP that shifts isoleucine to valine was identified in the PKA-anchoring protein (AKAP2) gene.This polymorphism is associated with reduced longevity and cardiac disease [23].Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have confirmed only three loci that affect longevity: FOXO3A, APOE, and an intergenic locus on chromosome 5q33.3[24][25][26]."
},
{
"document_id": "da4a9500-831f-48ab-acea-5ec7097276ed",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nStudies in various models have revealed that genetic differences and somatic mutations underlie longevity, but non-genetic contributions also play a major role (Cournil and Kirkwood, 2001).Calorie restriction (Bordone and Guarente, 2005), lowering of basal metabolic rate (Ruggiero et al., 2008), upregulated stress response (Migliaccio et al., 1999), restoration of mi-tonuclear protein balance (Houtkooper et al., 2013), and reduced fertility (Westendorp and Kirkwood, 1998) have all been shown to correlate with lifespan extension.These observations illuminate the role of ''epi''-genetic mechanisms in modulating longevity pathways."
},
{
"document_id": "932ef21b-9235-4210-a99c-6153a901bb89",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nHuman longevity and healthy aging show moderate heritability (20%-50%).We conducted a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies from 9 studies from the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology Consortium for 2 outcomes: (1) all-cause mortality, and (2) survival free of major disease or death.No single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) was a genome-wide significant predictor of either outcome (p Ͻ 5 ϫ 10 Ϫ8 ).We found 14 independent SNPs that predicted risk of death, and 8 SNPs that predicted event-free survival (p Ͻ 10 Ϫ5 ).These SNPs are in or near genes that are highly expressed in the brain (HECW2, HIP1, BIN2, GRIA1), genes involved in neural development and function (KCNQ4, LMO4, GRIA1, NETO1) and autophagy (ATG4C), and genes that are associated with risk of various diseases including cancer and Alzheimer's disease.In addition to considerable overlap between the traits, pathway and network analysis corroborated these findings.These findings indicate that variation in genes involved in neurological processes may be an important factor in regulating aging free of major disease and achieving longevity."
},
{
"document_id": "aff67cef-4bf7-42dc-826b-2a259722008d",
"section_type": "main",
"text": "\n\nAs our society is growing older, the consequences of aging have begun to gain particular attention.Improvement of quality of life at old age and prevention of age-associated diseases have become the main focus of the aging research.The process of aging in humans is complex and underlies multiple influences, with the probable involvement of heritable and various environmental factors.In particular, hormones are decisively involved in the generation of aging.Over time, important circulating hormones decline due to a reduced secretion of the pituitary, the adrenal glands and the gonads or due to an intercurrent disease.Among them, serum levels of growth factors and sexual steroids show significant aging-associated changes.Within the scope of the Explorative Project 'Genetic aetiology of human longevity' supported by the German National Genome Research Network 2 (NGFN-2) an in vitro model of human hormonal aging has been developed.Human SZ95 sebocytes were maintained under a hormone-substituted environment consisting of growth factors and sexual steroids in concentrations corresponding to those circulating in 20-and in 60-year-old women.Eight hundred and ninety-nine genes showed a differential expression in SZ95 sebocytes maintained under the 20-and 60-year-old hormone mixture, respectively.Among them genes were regulated which are involved in biological processes which are all hallmarks of aging.The most significantly altered signaling pathway identified was that of the transforming growth factor-b (TGF-b).A disturbed function of this cascade has been associated with tumorigenesis, i.e. in pancreatic, prostate, intestine, breast, and uterine cancer.Interestingly, genes expressed in signaling pathways operative in age-associated diseases such as Huntington's disease (HD), dentatorubral-pallidoluysian atrophy (DRPLA), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) were also identified.These data demonstrate that skin and its appendages may represent an adequate model for aging research.Hormones interact in a complex fashion, and aging may be partly attributed to the changes in their circulating blood levels.Furthermore, a disturbed hormone status may partially act towards the manifestation of neurodegenerative diseases.Thus, these results could be a basis for an integrated and interdisciplinary approach to the analysis of the aging process."
}
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"keywords": [
"APOE",
"FOXO3A",
"IGF",
"insulin",
"GH",
"LPA",
"HLA-DQA1/DRB1",
"CHRNA3/5",
"CDKN2A/B",
"SH2B3"
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"object": "We conclude that 1 GH signaling is normal in obesity, 2 in the obese state, the preservation of IGF-I with fasting and the augmented GH-induced central insulin resistance indicate increased hepatic GH sensitivity, 3 blunted GH levels in obesity may protect against insulin resistance without compromising IGF-I status.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab999203"
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"object": "insulin and IGF-I activate their cognate receptors and IGF-I also activates naturally occuring IGF-I/insulin hybrid receptors HR IGF-II activates insulin receptor, IGF-I receptor and HR",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab419763"
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"object": "Data suggest that the redox status of serum apoE might be related to the synthesis of HDL; the cysteine-thiol residue of reduced-apoE is in a naive state, while that of non-reduced-apoE is in a reversibly or irreversibly oxidized state. Data suggest that apoE homodimer and apoE-AII complex are typical reversibly oxidized forms of apoE. apoE-AII complex = a complex of apolipoprotein E and apolipoprotein A-II",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab212832"
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"object": "By depressing association of IGFs with soluble IGFBPs, Zn2+ is shown to repartition either [125I]-IGF-I or [125I]-IGF-II from soluble IGFBP-5 onto cell surface IGF receptors at physiological doses depressing IGF binding to IGFBP-5 and IGF-2R",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab112518"
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"object": "Study found that IL-6, GP130, IGF-1 and IGF-1R were highly expressed in non-small cell lung cancer NSCLC and there was the correlation between GP130, IGF-1, and IGF-1R. Co-stimulation of IL-6 and IGF-1 resulted in significantly enhanced cell proliferation, invasion, and apoptosis of NSCLC cells. This experiment revealed that IL-6 and IGF-1 can synergistically promote the progression of NSCLC.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab741940"
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{
"object": "Circulating IGF-I appears to be growth hormone GH-independent in GH deficiency GHD patients with a low IGF-I, but remains partially GH-dependent in GHD patients with a normal IGF-I.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab141796"
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"object": "Prospective associations of insulin, IGF-I, IGF-II and IGFBP-3 with physical performance in Caerphilly Prospective Study and cross-sectional insulin, IGF-I, IGF-II, IGFBP-2 and IGFBP-3 in the Boyd Orr cohort, were examined.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab618236"
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{
"object": "Confirmation of the impairment of GH-IGF-1 release in hyperphagic MC4R KO mice suggests a role for insulin in regulating both the release of GH, but also in mediating growth during periods of physiologically suppressed GH-IGF-1 levels",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab154279"
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"object": "Low apoE and mir-650 plasma concentrations were risk factors for developing Alzheimer's disease AD and were particularly pronounced in severe dementia. APOE E4 allele in both AD patients and controls led to a reduction in apoE, while APOE E3/E3 genotype was associated with an increased apoE concentration and level of miR-107 in AD, which inversely correlated with the number of APOE E4 alleles.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab459467"
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"object": "Insulin receptor substrates 1 and 2 IRS-1 and IRS-2 were targeted and compared as central distributors of the insulin signal, the insulin receptor, the insulin-like growth factor 1 receptor, and the insulin receptor-related receptor.",
"predicate": "http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#comment",
"subject": "ndd791caee50643ad90a986f563d2a0dab419969"
}
],
"question": "What genetic factors influence aging in humans?",
"subquestions": null,
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