1. Translational error in mice increases with ageing in an organ-dependent manner.
- Author
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Böttger EC, Santhosh Kumar H, Steiner A, Sotirakis E, Thiam K, Isnard Petit P, Seebeck P, Wolfer DP, Shcherbakov D, and Akbergenov R
- Subjects
- Animals, Mice, Codon, Terminator genetics, Brain metabolism, Liver metabolism, Gene Knock-In Techniques, Male, Genes, Reporter, Mice, Inbred C57BL, Ribosomes metabolism, Ribosomes genetics, Female, Humans, Organ Specificity, Aging genetics, Aging metabolism, Protein Biosynthesis
- Abstract
The accuracy of protein synthesis and its relation to ageing has been of long-standing interest. To study whether spontaneous changes in the rate of ribosomal error occur as a function of age, we first determined that stop-codon readthrough is a more sensitive read-out of mistranslation due to codon-anticodon mispairing than missense amino acid incorporation. Subsequently, we developed knock-in mice for in-vivo detection of stop-codon readthrough using a gain-of-function Kat2-TGA-Fluc readthrough reporter which combines fluorescent and sensitive bioluminescent imaging techniques. We followed expression of reporter proteins in-vivo over time, and assessed Kat2 and Fluc expression in tissue extracts and by whole organ ex-vivo imaging. Collectively, our results provide evidence for an organ-dependent, age-related increase in translational error: stop-codon readthrough increases with age in muscle (+ 75%, p < 0.001) and brain (+ 50%, p < 0.01), but not in liver (p > 0.5). Together with recent data demonstrating premature ageing in mice with an error-prone ram mutation, our findings highlight age-related decline of translation fidelity as a possible contributor to ageing., Competing Interests: Competing interests: We declare that none of the authors have competing financial or non-financial interests as defined by Nature Portfolio., (© 2025. The Author(s).)
- Published
- 2025
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