What humans can learn from animals that age better than we do
Vera Gorbunova will share groundbreaking research on the biological mechanisms of aging at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC’s next Maury Strauss Distinguished Public Lecture.
Vera Gorbunova is a comparative biologist who studies the functions of some of the longest-living mammals. On Thursday, she he will discuss how her research findings could be applied to people at the 2024-25 Maury Strauss Distinguished Public Lecture Series at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC. Photo courtesy of Vera Gorbunova.
Similar animal species can age at very different rates. A naked mole rat, for instance, can live up to 40 years, while its average mouse counterpart rarely reaches 10.
Why the difference? Biologist Vera Gorbunova is uncovering the answers — discoveries that could have meaningful implications for human health.
Gorbunova, a professor and co-director of the University of Rochester’s Aging Research Center, studies longevity and cancer resistance in mammals with extraordinary lifespans. Her lab studies long-lived mammals in hopes of creating interventions to prevent and treat age-related diseases in humans.
She will deliver a talk about the “Mechanisms of Longevity: From Mice to Whales” at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC in Roanoke at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 10.
“Keeping people healthy as they age is a primary goal of modern medicine here and across the globe. Gorbunova’s research provides fascinating new insights with important implications for the prevention of cancer, the reduction of age-related inflammation-associated diseases, and an overall increase in health span, not just longevity,” said Michael Friedlander, Virginia Tech’s vice president for health sciences and technology and executive director of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute.
“Her work complements biomedical and health sciences research taking place at the institute and across Virginia Tech, and the lecture promises to provide a provocative and novel exploration of the science of the aging process – a topic of interest to all,” Friedlander said.
Wondering why naked mole rats tend to live long, cancer-free lives, Gorbunova and her research team designed an experiment. They introduced a gene from the naked mole rat to a mouse to see the impacts of hyaluronic acid — a substance many mammals naturally produce — on health span. They found that modified mice had a lower incidence of cancer, experienced less age-related inflammation, and lived longer than their unmodified counterparts.
Beyond rodents, Gorbunova is looking at the longevity secrets of the bowhead whale, renowned for its 200-year lifespan.
Recent findings from Gorbunova’s lab suggest that the DNA repair process is far more accurate and efficient in bowhead whales than in other species, including humans. This efficient DNA repair, Gorbunova’s team found, could potentially help prevent many of the illnesses that occur due to cumulative hits to genetic material in our cells.
Gorbunova has been working to develop techniques to apply her discoveries to humans in order to increase health span, not just to live longer with the specter of later years in declining health and facing increased disease burden. Findings from her work suggest that some of the principal longevity mechanisms in other mammals already exist in humans, but at much lower levels.
Gorbunova is the Doris Johns Cherry Professor of Biology at the University of Rochester, where her research on the biology of exceptionally long-lived mammals is widely recognized as leading the field. She helped pioneer the comparative biology approach to aging research, especially as it relates to tumor suppression and genome stability. Among many awards, Gorbunova’s work has been recognized with a Cozzarelli Prize from the National Academy of Sciences.
The public is invited to attend the lecture, made possible through the support of the late Maury Strauss, a Roanoke businessman and philanthropist. Thanks to his gift, the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC continues to bring the world’s leading researchers to the Roanoke community.
The lecture will be on Oct. 10 at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at 2 Riverside Circle in Roanoke. The program begins with a reception with refreshments at 5 p.m. The lecture, which begins at 5:30 p.m., also will be livestreamed via Zoom.
