Abstract
Heart disease remains the most frequent cause of death in the general population with increasing incidence in the elderly population. The pathologic failure of the aging heart may be related to structural and functional alterations in cardiac muscle cells. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying the aging-related decline in cardiac muscle function are largely unknown. To provide the first analysis of cardiac aging at the level of gene expression, we established and compared cDNA libraries from apparently healthy young and aged mouse ventricular cardiac muscle cells. We report the identification of genes that exhibit aging-related changes of mRNA levels. Aging expression profiles in aged hearts indicate decreased cellular adaptation and protection against stress-induced injury together with the development of contractile dysfunction. The data suggest reduced activity of the mitochondrial electron transport system and reduced levels of cardiac-specific transcription regulators. The cardiomyocyte aging profile of gene expression displays similarities with known heart disorders. Genes whose mRNA levels change with aging in cardiomyocytes might profoundly affect pathological changes in the heart.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 3788-3794 |
| Number of pages | 7 |
| Journal | Nucleic acids research |
| Volume | 30 |
| Issue number | 17 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Sep 1 2002 |
Funding
The authors thank Xuesong Gu (Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center) for her assistance in Affymetrix array analyses and J. Goodhaus (Princeton University, Department of Molecular Biology) for his assistance in confocal microscopy. We also thank Jeanne Wei, Simon Robson, Mark Gray, Tony Hollenberg, Roumen Pankov and Chu Choi for helpful discussions. This work was supported by the American Heart Association grant DC03299 and National Institutes of Health grant HL62458 to A.U. and AG18536 to K.K.
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Genetics
