Telomerase helps maintain telomere length in our cells, influences how our bodies age, and why we develop diseases like cancer. If cells had enough telomerase, telomeres might not shorten at all. But in most somatic cells, it’s present in very low amounts — only enough to slow the telomere shortening down.
This is part of a short series of videos where we explore telomeres, telomere length and telomerase, as well as the impacts they have on our health.
Chapters:
00:00 What is telomerase?
00:25 What happens when telomeres are too short?
00:38 How does telomerase work?
01:23 How does telomerase affect cancer risk and aging?
Watch the next video explaining Telomere Biology Disorders: [ Ссылка ]
Missed the previous video on the end replication problem, and how telomere shortening affects aging? [ Ссылка ]
RepeatDx is a leading clinical laboratory for telomere length testing. You can find out more on our website: [ Ссылка ]
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References
1. Aubert G, Lansdorp PM. Telomeres and aging. Physiol Rev. 2008;88(2):557-579. doi:10.1152/physrev.00026.2007.
2. Barthel, F.P., Wei, W., Tang, M., Martinez-Ledesma, E., Hu, X., Amin, S.B., Akdemir, K.C., Seth, S., Song, X., Wang, Q., et al. (2017). Systematic analysis of telomere length and somatic alterations in 31 cancer types. Nat Genet 49, 349-357.
3. Blasco, M. A. et al. Telomere shortening and tumor formation by mouse cells lacking telomerase RNA. Cell 91, 25-34 (1997).
4. Rudolph, K, L., Chang, S., Lee, H-W., Blasco, M., Gottlieb, G, J., Greider, C., DePinho, R,A. Longevity, Stress Response, and Cancer in Aging Telomerase-Deficient Mice. Cell. 1999; 96:5.701-712.[ Ссылка ]80580-2.
5. Aubert, G., Baerlocher, G. M., Vulto, I., Poon, S. S. & Lansdorp, P. M. Collapse of telomere homeostasis in hematopoietic cells caused by heterozygous mutations in telomerase genes. PLoS Genet 8, e1002696, doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1002696 (2012).
