As people age it was shown that their longer genes are no longer expressed. This research looked at worms, mice, humans, and in particular humans with neurodegenerative diseases. Most research prior has tried to find specific genes or patterns that cause aging, however it was truly about the lengths of the genes. The longer genes are more chance of being damaged. The study focused on aging and neurodegenerative diseases because neural cells are known to be long and slow at dividing. Many of the genes that are associated with diseases like Alzheimers are very long so they are more susceptible of being damaged which could cause these neurodegenerative diseases. Future studies still need to be done in order to find the cause of this phenomenon.
In my opinion, I think this is a great find in research and I believe with further studies this could help a lot of people with neurodegenerative diseases. Neurodegenerative diseases affect many people as they age and there is still not much known about why and I believe this step of figuring out that aging is related to the length of genes rather than specific genes is a start.
Article Link: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/03/240321155352.htm
Additional Link: https://www.news-medical.net/news/20240322/Aging-linked-to-length-of-genes-study-suggests.aspx
This is somewhat counter intuitive to what I had thought. I thought longer genes meant more robust-ness persay. Perhaps I am just thinking of the length of the telomere. Interesting study.
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