Genome-wide approaches to understanding human ageing

Table 2 Potential conserved determinants of longevity.

Gene family	Description
Catalase	Increased catalase activity increases life span in yeast [62] and mice [63]
Insulin/insulin-like growth factor-I receptor	Mutation of insulin and insulin-likegrowth factor-I receptor genes increases life span in worms, [64, 65] flies [66] and mice [67, 68]
Rpd3	Deletion of RPD3 increases life span in yeast [69] and flies [70]
Sch9/Akt	Decreased SCH9/AKT activity increases life span in yeast [25, 26, 62, 71] and worms [72–74]
Sir2	Increased expression of Sir2-family proteins increases life span in yeast, [75] worms [76] and flies [77]. Avariant allele of a human homolog, SIRT3, isreported to correlated with longevity [78, 45]
Superoxide dismutase	Increased superoxide dismutase activity increases life span in yeast [62] and flies [79]
TOR	Decreased TOR activity increases life span in yeast, [26, 80] worms [81, 82] and flies [83]

Genes shown have been reported to increase life span when mutated in more than one organism.

ISSN: 1479-7364