Volume 1 Issue 5, May 2021

Long-term exposure to air pollution is harmful to human health, causing damage to respiratory and cardiovascular systems. A new study provides evidence that even short-term, relatively low-level air pollution can be detrimental for cognitive function, and suggests the possibility that a commonly used drug might help reduce the harmful effects.

Chronic inflammation, or ‘inflammaging’, is a key process in age-related diseases, and identification of the molecular players involved is a top priority. Cai and Han identified an evolutionary conserved functional lncRNA able to modulate the release of inflammatory SASP molecules from senescent cells through the NF-κB pathway.

The tumor microenvironment (TME) impacts different phases of tumor progression and therapy resistance. Zhang et al. show that senescent stromal cells activate an epigenetic program that controls the senescence-associated secretory phenotype and can be targeted to boost responses to chemotherapy.

This Review discusses evidence linking age-related hearing loss to depression and presents a model for the underlying neurobiological pathways, offering direction for future research to reduce risk for depression for older adults with impaired hearing.

In a cohort of older men from the Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study, exposure to fine particulate matter (PM_2.5), over just a few weeks and under levels considered hazardous, was found to impede cognitive function in older adults, but the adverse effects were lessened in people taking nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs.

Aging, inflammation and senescence are controlled by NFκB. Cai and Han identify by comparative genomics a family of lncRNAs that are increasingly expressed during aging by NFκB-driven transcription, and find that many of these aging-associated lncRNAs regulate NFκB activity in turn.

Senescent cells and their production of inflammatory cytokines (senescence-associated secretory phenotype) affects aging and disease, including cancer. Zhang et al. report that epigenomic remodeling by KDM4 controls the senescence-associated secretory phenotype, and KDM4 expression by stromal cells of the tumor microenvironment promotes prostate cancer.

Walker et al. report a proteome-wide association study that identifies 38 candidate proteins in nondemented older adults that are associated with future dementia risk. Pathway analysis of these proteins implicates immune, lipid, metabolic signaling and hemostasis pathways in dementia pathogenesis.