Psychological Wellbeing and Healthy Aging: Focus on Telomeres

Telomeres and aging.

Telomeres play a central role in cell fate and aging by adjusting the cellular response to stress and growth stimulation on the basis of previous cell divisions and DNA damage. At least a few hundred nucleotides of telomere repeats must "cap" each chromosome end to avoid activation of DNA repair pathways. Repair of critically short or "uncapped" telomeres by telomerase or recombination is limit...

Aging, telomeres, and atherosclerosis.

Although the level and pace of population aging display high geographical variability, virtually all countries have been experiencing growth in their elderly population, particularly in developed nations. Because aging is a major risk factor for atherosclerosis and associated disease, it is of up most importance to unravel the molecular mechanisms involved in vascular aging. Telomeres are speci...

Telomeres and Reproductive Aging

Telomeres are special deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) structures that “cap” the ends of eukaryote chromosomes. The term telomere derives from the Greek words telos, meaning “end”, and meros meaning “part”. The existence of these end-parts of chromosomes was first suggested in 1938 by Muller (Muller, 1938). Telomere length is involved in biological aging and disease processes. Telomere length is aff...

Psychological stress, telomeres, and telomerase.

Telomeres, Telomerase, Stress, and Aging

Why should a behavioral scientist study telomeres? Mainte nance of telomeres, the natural ends of linear chromosomes, is a fundamental biological mechanism of all eukaryotic cells, from protozoa to humans. Gradual shortening of telomeres after each cell division eventually can lead to loss of cellular division capacity and cell death, and contribute to genomic instability, a characteristic of c...