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Direct care workers in long-term care settings are essential to provide care for older adults and people with disabilities who have daily needs. There is an increasing demand for an adequately sized and well-prepared direct care workforce to support people living with dementia due to its rising prevalence. However, a lack of standardized policies and data leaves researchers and policymakers with little evidence to guide the development and refinement of workforce policies. The National Institute...

Aging increases vulnerability to cognitive decline after repetitive mild traumatic brain injury (rm-TBI), yet mechanisms linking age-related factors to neurodegeneration remain poorly understood. This study investigated how brain-derived exosomes from aged mice (A-Exo) worsen rm-TBI outcomes. In a murine rm-TBI model, intranasal A-Exo administration significantly exacerbated spatial memory deficits and hippocampal neuronal apoptosis compared to brain-derived exosomes from young mice (Y-Exo) or...

Age-related renal impairment often occurs insidiously and has become an important cause of chronic renal failure, especially when individuals with other chronic diseases. However, there is lack of effective treatments. Research on diabetic patients has revealed that empagliflozin (EMPA), one of sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT-2) inhibitors, exhibits a distinct protective effect on aging kidneys. EMPA has been shown to improve renal fibrosis and ameliorate inflammatory cytokines, including...

We previously reported that T96K is a gain-of-function mutation in TREM2 based on its ability to increase ligand-dependent activation. Here, we show that TREM2^(T96K) increases risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD) in a whole-genome sequencing dataset comprised of family-based and case-control samples. Trem2^(T96K) also reduced clustering of microglia around β-amyloid (Aβ) plaques exclusively in female 5xFAD mice. Furthermore, T96K decreased levels of soluble Trem2 in female 5xFAD mice and human...

Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease (AD), Parkinson's disease (PD), and Huntington's disease (HD) are major public health challenges. Current treatments are only symptomatic and do not address the underlying pathogenic genetic mechanisms. The development of the CRISPR/Cas genome editing tool has increased possibilities for targeted repair of pathological mutations. CRISPR/Cas9, Cas12, and Cas13 systems enable targeted editing and transcriptome modulation in various preclinical...

Cu/Zn superoxide dismutase 1 (SOD1) is essential for maintaining neural health. Its functions include modulating metabolism, maintaining redox balance, regulating transcription, besides eliminating superoxide radicals, which are achieved through various post-translational modifications (PTMs). Consequently, unusual PTMs in SOD1 can impair its functionality and stability, leading to the accumulation of misfolded SOD1 and the increase of oxidative stress markers, hallmarks of Amyotrophic Lateral...

Patient-specific, human-based cellular models integrating a biomimetic blood-brain barrier, immune, and myelinated neuron components are critically needed to enable accelerated, translationally relevant discovery of neurological disease mechanisms and interventions. To construct a human cell-based model that includes these features and all six major brain cell types needed to mimic disease and dissect pathological mechanisms, we have constructed, characterized, and utilized a multicellular...

Alzheimer's disease is a neurodegenerative disorder with a variable rate of progression. Predictive tools that can leverage the available modalities of data in any setting to predict the progression of the disease will benefit clinicians and patients alike. However, most of the tools lack the ability to quantify the uncertainty and do not provide the reasoning behind the predictions. In this work, we propose a novel Bayesian Encoder-Decoder GRU (BEND-GRU) framework to predict a patient's...

Tau misfolding into β-sheet-rich filaments and subsequent recruitment of monomeric tau are central to Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathogenesis. While cryo-EM has resolved the conformation of the AD tau core, the structural features conferring biological activity remain unclear. Here, we investigated how tau filament core structure and post-translational modifications influence seeding capacity in neurons and mice. Our findings show that although filament structure impacts seeding, the AD tau core...

Neuronal aggregates of Tau are a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease (AD), but more than half of the patients exhibit additional TDP-43 inclusions, while some have co-aggregates of the two proteins. The presence of such co-aggregates is associated with increased disease severity, although whether there is a causal relationship remains unclear. Here, we demonstrate that Tau and TDP-43 mutually promote each other's condensation through direct interaction in vitro, forming irregularly-shaped or...

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CONCLUSIONS: Veterans with HZ were at a higher risk of fragility fractures relative to Veterans without HZ, highlighting the need for improved fracture prevention among those diagnosed with HZ. Further research in non-Veteran and female populations will improve generalizability.

The microbiota-gut-brain axis (MGBA) is increasingly recognized as a critical regulator of brain health, influencing both neurodevelopment and age-related neurological decline. Disruptions in this axis, driven by gut dysbiosis, have been implicated in the pathogenesis of a wide range of neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorders. This review synthesizes current evidence linking microbiota alterations to Alzheimer's disease (AD), Parkinson's disease (PD), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis...

Silicosis is an occupational lung disease characterized by diffuse pulmonary fibrosis resulting from inhalation of silica particles. As the disease progresses, lung tissue stiffness continuously increases, driving persistent activation and accumulation of myofibroblasts. However, whether these cells undergo senescence in response to prolonged high matrix stiffness and how such senescence impacts fibrosis progression remain unclear. Here, we established an in vitro model using decellularized lung...

The aging process is characterized by a general decrease in physical functionality and poses the biggest risk factor for a variety of diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and neurodegenerative disorders among others. Understanding the naturally evolved mechanisms that slow aging and rejuvenate an animal could reveal important concepts on how to prevent age-associated diseases and even revert aging. The C. elegans dauer stage is a robust and long-lived alternative developmental state...

CONCLUSION: Personal values and priorities were central to motivations towards healthy longevity. HLM should assess and align diagnostic and treatment plans with individual preferences to support sustainable health behaviours. The Singapore public's alignment with government policies presents an opportunity to promote HLM adoption.

CONCLUSION: Our study provides robust evidence for bidirectional causal relationships between chronic inflammation and intrinsic capacity decline, highlighting inflammation as a potential target for interventions to promote healthy aging. Future research should explore these relationships in diverse populations and investigate therapeutic strategies to mitigate inflammation-related declines in intrinsic capacity.

Metabolic dysregulation is a hallmark of aging. Here, we investigate in mice age-induced metabolic alterations using metabolomics and stable isotope tracing. Circulating metabolite fluxes and serum and tissue concentrations were measured in young and old (20-30 months) C57BL/6J mice, with young obese (ob/ob) mice as a comparator. For major circulating metabolites, concentrations changed more with age than fluxes, and fluxes changed more with obesity than with aging. Specifically, glucose,...

Radiation enteritis, affecting over 90% of pelvic/abdominal radiotherapy patients, is primarily caused by radiation-induced reactive oxygen and nitrogen species (RONS). Active hydrogens, with broad-spectrum RONS scavenging ability, show radioprotective potential but face delivery challenges due to the intestinal mucus barrier and short lifespan. Here, we show drinkable, self-thermophoretic sodium alginate/chitosan oligosaccharide-coated hydrogenated molybdenum oxide nanomachines...

Mechanisms of T cell aging involve cell-intrinsic alterations and interactions with immune and stromal cells. Here we found that splenic T cells exhibit greater functional decline than lymph node T cells within the same aged mouse, prompting investigation into how the aged spleen contributes to T cell aging. Proteomic analysis revealed increased expression of heme detoxification in aged spleen-derived lymphocytes. Exposure to the heme- and iron-rich aged splenic microenvironment induced aging...