Insulin regulates the secretion of the antiaging horm...( Boston MA--Dr. Carmela Abraham a pro...),Health
Boston, MA--Dr. Carmela Abraham, a professor of biochemistry and medicine at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM), reports this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences new findings on Klotho, an anti-aging gene that is associated with life span extension in rodents and humans. Dr. Abrahams interest in Klotho stems from her studies comparing the expression of genes in young and old brains.
Dr. Abraham and her colleagues observed that the levels of Klotho in the brain showed a striking decrease with aging. The association between Klotho and aging prompted Abrahams group to investigate the regulation of Klotho further. These studies lead to the observation that secretion of Klotho is regulated by insulin.
The Klotho protein sits in the membrane of certain cells but is also found circulating in serum and cerebrospinal fluid, which indicates that it is secreted. The fact that Klotho is secreted suggested that enzymes that act like scissors must be involved in the liberation of Klotho from the cell membrane.
Dr. Ci-Di Chen, an assistant professor working in Dr. Abrahams group, then sought to identify the enzymes responsible for Klotho release and also investigated other factors that may affect the release of active Klotho.
To their surprise, they found that insulin, a hormone usually associated with diabetes, increases significantly the levels of secreted Klotho. The reason this finding is important is because excess insulin has been previously implicated in a biochemical pathway that is associated with a decreased life span and elevated oxidative stress.
In addition, this observation provides a potentially pivotal link between Klotho and sugar metabolism, and raises an intriguing relationship between Klotho and type II diabetes, commonly known as late onset diabetes. The authors are proposing a novel mechanism of action for Klotho whereby insulin increases Klotho secretion, i.e., activit
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| Contact: Gina Digravio gina.digravio@bmc.org 617-638-8491 Boston University Source:Eurekalert |
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