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Healthy aging relies on a symbiotic host-microbiota relationship. The age-associated decline of the immune system can pose a threat to this delicate equilibrium. In this work, we investigated how the functional deterioration of T cells can affect host-microbiota symbiosis and gut barrier integrity and the implications of this deterioration for inflammaging, senescence, and health decline. Using the Tfam^(fl/fl)Cd4^(Cre) mouse model, we found that T cell failure compromised gut immunity leading...

ObjectivesSensory loss is associated with increased dementia risk, yet the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. This longitudinal study examined the association between self-reported sensory difficulty (vision, hearing, dual), social and physical activity, and dementia risk among older U.S. adults.MethodsData were drawn from the 2015-2020 National Health and Aging Trends Study (N = 6,295). Discrete-time survival mediation models with a structural equation modeling-based approach were estimated...

The disposable soma theory (DST) posits that organisms prioritize reproductive success over long-term somatic maintenance, resulting in an inevitable decline after reproduction. However, such a basis does not fully explain the human brain's capacity to preserve metabolically costly, plastic, and cognitively essential functions well beyond the reproductive peak. This Perspective challenges the universality of DST by proposing that brain aging follows a selectively resilient trajectory, shaped by...

Torpor is a naturally occurring state of metabolic suppression that enables animals to adapt and survive extreme environmental conditions. Inspired by this adaptation, researchers have pursued synthetic torpor-an artificially induced, reversible hypometabolic state with transformative medical potential. Achieving synthetic torpor has been pursued for over a hundred years, with earlier work focused on identifying drugs for systemically suppressing metabolism. Breakthroughs in 2020 identified key...

Technique could provide cheap fertilizer and prevent harmful nutrient runoff

Move follows Trump administration finding that school didn’t effectively combat antisemitism

Interbreeding with tomatoes 9 million years ago gave potatoes the genes to develop tubers

Microglia are crucial targets for therapeutic interventions in diseases like Alzheimer's and stroke, but efficient gene delivery to these immune cells is challenging. We developed an adeno-associated virus (AAV) vector that achieves specific and efficient gene delivery to microglia. This vector incorporates the mIba1 promoter, GFP, miRNA target sequences (miR.Ts), WPRE, and poly(A) signal. Positioning miR.Ts on both sides of WPRE significantly suppressed non-microglial expression, achieving over...

A DNA editing tool TaqTth-hpRNA was developed in this study, composed of a compact recombinant TaqTth nuclease (832 aa) and a simple hairpin-RNA guiding probe (hpRNA). In vitro biochemical studies showed the TaqTth-hpRNA efficiently cleaves artificially synthesized single-stranded DNA without stringent sequence motif like protospacer adjacent motif (PAM). It can also cleave the genomic DNA of Escherichia coli with ∼80% efficiency. The TaqTth-hpRNA cleavage of genomic DNA in mammalian cells...

Introduction Cardiac autonomic dysfunction reduces the cardiac system's ability to respond to stressors and is prevalent in aging and diseases, especially cardiovascular diseases like aortic stenosis (AS). Heart rate variability (HRV) is a common measure for evaluating parasympathetic activity and cardiac autonomic function; similarly, heart rate (HR) changes during exercise are utilized in determining cardiac health. However, directly measuring HR parameters from an electrocardiogram (ECG) is...

The global demographic shift towards an ageing population has rendered cardiovascular ageing and its associated pathologies a growing challenge for health. Emerging evidence highlights the critical role of exercise in mitigating age-associated cardiovascular alterations in structure and function and preventing ageing-associated cardiovascular diseases. However, the precise molecular mechanisms mediating these exercise-induced benefits in promoting healthy cardiovascular ageing remains...

The endocycle is a specialized cell cycle during which cells undergo repeated G/S phases to replicate DNA without division, leading to large polyploid cells. The transition from a mitotic cycle to an endocycle can be triggered by various stresses, which results in unscheduled, or induced endocycling cells (iECs). While iECs can be beneficial for wound healing, they can also be detrimental by impairing tissue growth or promoting cancer. However, the regulation of endocycling and its role in...

Reproductive longevity is essential for female fertility and healthy aging; however, the role of stress response, especially stress granule accumulation, in ovarian aging remains elusive and interventions are lacking. Here, we identified deleterious mutations and decreased expression of NCOA7, a stress-response protein related to granulosa cell senescence in women with physiological and pathological ovarian aging. NCOA7 deletion accelerates oxidative stress-related cellular senescence, ovarian...

This randomized cross-over study examined the acute effects of single-task or dual-task walking physical activity (PA) breaks of prolonged sitting among healthy older adults on cognitive performance and cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFv). Twenty-seven healthy older adults (69.4 ± 5.6 years, 25 female) were randomly assigned to engage in three experimental conditions (i.e., control, single-task, and dual-task walking), each one on a different day. All conditions included 3 h of sitting time,...

CONCLUSIONS: Among older people, all-cause mortality risk significantly increased with the severity of visual and hearing impairments, and the visual and hearing impairments accounted for 10.8% of total deaths. These findings emphasize the importance of vigilant monitoring and management of visual and hearing impairments.