Cell-autonomous mechanisms of chronological aging in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae
Authors:Anthony Arlia-Ciommo#, Anna Leonov#, Amanda Piano#, Veronika Svistkova# and Vladimir I. Titorenko
doi: 10.15698/mic2014.06.152
Volume 1, pp. 163 to 178, published 27/05/2014.
Department of Biology, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec H4B 1R6, Canada.
# These authors contributed equally to this work.
Keywords:
yeast chronological aging; systems biology of cellular aging; cell-autonomous mechanisms of longevity regulation; proteostasis; lipid metabolism; mitochondria; carbohydrate metabolism.
Corresponding Author(s):
Conflict of interest statement:
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Please cite this article as:
Anthony Arlia-Ciommo, Anna Leonov, Amanda Piano, Veronika Svistkova and Vladimir I. Titorenko (2014). Cell-autonomous mechanisms of chronological aging in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Microbial Cell 1(6): 163-178.
© 2014 Arlia-Ciommo et al. This is an open-access article released under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows the unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are acknowledged.
Abstract:
A body of evidence supports the view that the signaling pathways governing cellular aging – as well as mechanisms of their modulation by longevity-extending genetic, dietary and pharmacological interventions – are conserved across species. The scope of this review is to critically analyze recent advances in our understanding of cell-autonomous mechanisms of chronological aging in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Based on our analysis, we propose a concept of a biomolecular network underlying the chronology of cellular aging in yeast. The concept posits that such network progresses through a series of lifespan checkpoints. At each of these checkpoints, the intracellular concentrations of some key intermediates and products of certain metabolic pathways – as well as the rates of coordinated flow of such metabolites within an intricate network of intercompartmental communications – are monitored by some checkpoint-specific ʺmaster regulatorʺ proteins. The concept envisions that a synergistic action of these master regulator proteins at certain early-life and late-life checkpoints modulates the rates and efficiencies of progression of such processes as cell metabolism, growth, proliferation, stress resistance, macromolecular homeostasis, survival and death. The concept predicts that, by modulating these vital cellular processes throughout lifespan (i.e., prior to an arrest of cell growth and division, and following such arrest), the checkpoint-specific master regulator proteins orchestrate the development and maintenance of a pro- or anti-aging cellular pattern and, thus, define longevity of chronologically aging yeast.