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Contribution of Retrotransposable Elements to Aging

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Human Retrotransposons in Health and Disease

Abstract

Retrotransposable elements (RTEs) are abundant in the genomes of most species and continue to evolve and adapt to the defense mechanisms of their host cells. RTEs have contributed to the evolution of their hosts by creating germline genomic diversity, but under most circumstances retrotransposition has deleterious consequences. Our understanding of RTE activity in somatic cells and tissues has lagged, largely because we lacked effective tools to study them in these contexts. Recent evidence indicates that RTEs are more active in somatic cells than anticipated, for example in the nervous system, during the development of cancer, or in senescent cells and aging tissues. This raises the important question of whether RTEs contribute actively to these processes and the development of pathologies, and if so, how. In this review we focus on the role of RTEs in the biology of aging: the evidence for their activation, the host defense mechanisms whose failure may allow this, the consequences of the ensuing RTE activity, and the prospects that targeting RTEs may provide new avenues of treating some age-associated disorders.

Jill A. Kreiling and Brian C. Jones are co-first authors.

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Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the following sources of financial support: J.A.K., NIH K01 AG039410; B.C.J., NIH T32 AG041688, F31 AG047736; M.D.C., AFAR postdoctoral fellowship; S.W.C., NIH T32 GM007601, F31 AG050365; N.N., NIH R56 AG050582; S.L.H., NIH R01 AG024353, NIH P01 AG051449 and J.M.S., NIH R37 AG016694, NIH P01 AG051449.

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  1. Department of Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry, Brown University, Providence, RI, 02912, USA

    Jill A. Kreiling, Brian C. Jones, Jason G. Wood, Marco De Cecco, Steven W. Criscione, Nicola Neretti, Stephen L. Helfand & John M. Sedivy

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  1. Jill A. Kreiling
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  2. Brian C. Jones
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Correspondence to Stephen L. Helfand or John M. Sedivy .

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  1. Institute for Research on Cancer and Aging of Nice (IRCAN), French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Faculty of Medicine, University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis (UNS), Université Côte d’Azur (UCA), Nice, France

    Gael Cristofari

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Kreiling, J.A. et al. (2017). Contribution of Retrotransposable Elements to Aging. In: Cristofari, G. (eds) Human Retrotransposons in Health and Disease. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48344-3_13

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