Rattiste Kalev, Klandorf Hillar, Urvik Janek, Sepp Tuul, Asghar Muhammad, Hasselquist Dennis, Cooey Crissa, Hõrak Peeter
Department of Zoology, Institute of Environmental and Life Sciences, Estonian University of Life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi 1, 51014, Tartu, Estonia.
Biogerontology. 2015 Aug;16(4):435-41. doi: 10.1007/s10522-015-9564-1. Epub 2015 Mar 1.
The questions about why and how senescence occurs in the wild are among the most pertinent ones in evolutionary ecology. Telomere length is a commonly used marker for aging, while other biomarkers of aging have received considerably less attention. Here we studied how another potent indicator of aging-skin pentosidine concentration-relates to age and blood telomere length in a long-lived seabird with well-documented reproductive senescence. We found no associations between telomere length, skin pentosidine and chronological age in male common gulls (Larus canus), aging from 2 to 30 years. However, the variance in telomere length was 4.6 times higher among the birds older than 13 years, which hints at relaxed selection on telomere length among the birds that have passed their prime age of reproduction. These results suggest that physiological and chronological ages may be largely uncoupled in our study system. Furthermore, our findings do not support a hypothesis about the presence of a common physiological factor (e.g., such as oxidative stress) that would cause covariation between two independent markers of aging.
衰老为何以及如何在自然环境中发生，这些问题是进化生态学中最相关的问题之一。端粒长度是常用的衰老标志物，而其他衰老生物标志物受到的关注则少得多。在此，我们研究了另一种衰老的有效指标——皮肤戊糖苷浓度——与一种具有明确记录的生殖衰老的长寿海鸟的年龄和血液端粒长度之间的关系。我们发现，在年龄从2岁到30岁的雄性普通海鸥（Larus canus）中，端粒长度、皮肤戊糖苷与实际年龄之间没有关联。然而，在13岁以上的海鸥中，端粒长度的方差高出4.6倍，这表明在已过繁殖盛期的海鸥中，对端粒长度的选择有所放松。这些结果表明，在我们的研究系统中，生理年龄和实际年龄可能在很大程度上是不相关的。此外，我们的研究结果不支持存在一种共同生理因素（例如氧化应激）导致两种独立衰老标志物之间产生协变的假设。
