Research Paper Volume 9, Issue 7 pp 1825—1843
Aging and calorie restriction regulate the expression of miR-125a-5p and its target genes Stat3, Casp2 and Stard13
- 1 Center for Gene Regulation in Health and Disease and Department of Biological, Geological, and Environmental Sciences, Cleveland State University, Cleveland, OH 44115, USA
Received: June 10, 2017 Accepted: July 27, 2017 Published: July 31, 2017
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.101270How to Cite
Abstract
Calorie restriction (CR) is a dietary intervention known to delay aging. In order, to understand molecular mechanisms of CR, we analyzed the expression of 983 MicroRNAs (miRNAs) in the liver of female mice after 2 years of 30% CR using micro-array. 16 miRNAs demonstrated significant changes in their expression upon CR in comparison with age-matched control. mmu-miR-125a-5p (miR-125a-5p) was significantly upregulated upon CR, and in agreement with this, the expression of mRNAs for its three predicted target genes: Stat3, Casp2, and Stard13 was significantly downregulated in the liver of CR animals. The expression of precursor miRNA for miR-125a-5p was also upregulated upon CR, which suggests its regulation at the level of transcription. Upon aging miR-125a-5p expression was downregulated while the expression of its target genes was upregulated. Thus, CR prevented age-associated changes in the expression of miR-125a-5p and its targets. We propose that miR-125a-5p dependent downregulation of Stat3, Casp2, and Stard13 contributes to the calorie restriction-mediated delay of aging.
Abbreviations
miRNAs: MicroRNA; CR: Calorie Restriction; AL: Adlibitum; miR-125a-5p: mmu-miR-125a-5p; miR-145b: mmu-miR-145b; Casp2: Caspase2; WT: Wild Type; MUT: Mutant; NC: Negative Control.