Jul 28, 2020
Researcher Marc Vermulst and his
team have discovered how years of prion-like proteins cause
neurodegenerative disorders.
He explains
Marc Vermulst is an assistant
professor of gerontology at the University of Southern California.
He has had a lifelong interest in the human
aging process and signs of
aging and studies how our genome changes. He measures that
change and works to understand how this impacts our health.
Early in his career while studying premature
aging syndromes, he noted that most were characterized by an
instable genome—in other words, these early signs of aging were
accompanied by a genome that faced changes at a faster pace than
most normal genomes. This pushed him to his current interest in
genome change and aging.
He's been trying to link the
natural
aging process in a mechanistic way to age-related diseases. He
comments that while we see those disease occur as a result of the
aging process, what exactly is happening to cause those diseases
has not been clear; however, his work has identified what they
think may be a key cause, namely misfolded proteins that lead to
prion-like proteins, which result from transcription errors.
These proteins take on a life of their own and force other proteins
to conform to their shape, a shape that seems to be toxic to cells.
He explains this process in more detail and suggest long term goals
these findings may address such as medically relevant
therapies.
For more, see his
website: https://gero.usc.edu/faculty/marc-vermulst-phd/
Available on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/2Os0myK