Volume 33, No 11, Nov 2023

ISSN: 1001-0602 
EISSN: 1748-7838 2018 
impact factor 17.848* 
(Clarivate Analytics, 2019)

Volume 33 Issue 11, November 2023: 817-818

RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

Accelerated transcriptional elongation during aging impairs longevity

Alexander Tyshkovskiy¹ , Sirui Zhang¹ , Vadim N. Gladyshev^1,2,*

¹Division of Genetics, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
²Broad Institute, Cambridge, MA, USA
Correspondence: Vadim N. Gladyshev(vgladyshev@rics.bwh.harvard.edu)

Increased transcriptional errors in aged organisms have been demonstrated for multiple species; however, mechanistic details remained elusive. In a recent issue of Nature, Debès et al. reveal a novel form of aging-associated molecular damage, demonstrating that Pol II transcriptional elongation rate increases with age, presumably due to reduced nucleosomal density, whereas targeted reduction of Pol II speed can partially ameliorate this deleterious phenotype and extend lifespan in animals, such as roundworms and fruit flies.

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41422-023-00829-9

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