May 8, 2020
As a research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for
Biology of Ageing in Cologne, Germany, Dario Valenzano is trying to
understand the molecular and genetic bases underlying differences
between lifespans and ageing processes of different species, and
how we might be able to manipulate our own.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Why the daughters of older fathers have a slighter shorter lifespan than those of younger fathers
- How the shortest-lived vertebrate known to exist might shed light on human evolution and the development of human disease in late life
- How microbiota composition in the gastrointestinal tract changes during ageing
Some species live for just a few hours, while others live for thousands of years. Why and how have species evolved such different lifespans, and how might the answer to these questions allow us to increase our own longevity and reduce the risk of many diseases? These questions form the cornerstone of the research being carried out by Valenzano and his group.
As a model organism for this research, the team is using the
African turquoise killifish, which is the shortest-lived vertebrate
known to exist. This fish lives approximately four months both in
the lab and in its natural environment. In studying how this
species evolved to be so short-lived, they have found that
Darwinian selection has little to do with it; rather, Valenzano
says its short lifespan came about as a mere accident.
For this type of fish, there is little advantage to being
long-lived, and without selective pressure to survive for a long
time, selection doesn’t act to remove deleterious mutations in late
life. Valenzano explains what this might reveal about human
evolution, and in particular, late-life weakened selection in
humans that fails to remove deleterious mutations which result in
diseases like dementia.
Valenzano also discusses their research on the microbiome of fish, mice, and humans, which includes a look at how the microbiome changes over time and during the ageing process, and how microbes interact with the immune system during the ageing process.
Tune in for the full conversation and visit https://www.age.mpg.de/science/research-laboratories/valenzano/ to learn more.