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Discoveries made in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans revealed that aging is under genetic control. Since these transformative initial studies, C. elegans has become a premier model system for aging research. Critically, the genes, pathways, and processes that have fundamental roles in organismal aging are deeply conserved throughout evolution. This conservation has led to a wealth of knowledge regarding both the processes that influence aging and the identification of molecular and cellular hallmarks that play a causative role in the physiological decline of organisms. One key feature of age-associated decline is the failure of mechanisms that maintain proper function of the proteome (proteostasis). Here we highlight components of the proteostatic network that act to maintain the proteome and how this network integrates into major longevity signaling pathways. We focus in depth on the heat shock transcription factor 1 (HSF1), the central regulator of gene expression for proteins that maintain the cytosolic and nuclear proteomes, and a key effector of longevity signals.

The advent of feeding based RNAi in Caenorhabditis elegans led to an era of gene discovery in aging research. Hundreds of gerogenes were discovered, and many are evolutionarily conserved, raising the exciting possibility that the underlying genetic basis for healthy aging in higher vertebrates could be quickly deciphered. Yet, the majority of putative gerogenes have still only been cursorily characterized, highlighting the need for high-throughput, quantitative assessments of changes in aging. A widely used surrogate measure of aging is lifespan. The traditional way to measure mortality in C. elegans tracks the deaths of individual animals over time within a relatively small population. This traditional method provides straightforward, direct measurements of median and maximum lifespan for the sampled population. However, this method is time consuming, often underpowered, and involves repeated handling of a set of animals over time, which in turn can introduce contamination or possibly damage increasingly fragile, aged animals. We have previously developed an alternative “Replica Set” methodology, which minimizes handling and increases throughput by at least an order of magnitude. The Replica Set method allows changes in lifespan to be measured for over one hundred feeding-based RNAi clones by one investigator in a single experiment- facilitating the generation of large quantitative phenotypic datasets, a prerequisite for development of biological models at a systems level. Here, we demonstrate through analysis of lifespan experiments simulated in silico that the Replica Set method is at least as precise and accurate as the traditional method in evaluating and estimating lifespan, and requires many fewer total animal observations across the course of an experiment. Furthermore, we show that the traditional approach to lifespan experiments is more vulnerable than the Replica Set method to experimental and measurement error. We find no compromise in statistical power for Replica Set experiments, even for moderate effect sizes, or when simulated experimental errors are introduced. We compare and contrast the statistical analysis of data generated by the two approaches, and highlight pitfalls common with the traditional methodology. Collectively, our analysis provides a standard of measure for each method across comparable parameters, which will be invaluable in both experimental design and evaluation of published data for lifespan studies.

The Myc family of transcription factors regulates a variety of biological processes, including the cell cycle, growth, proliferation, metabolism, and apoptosis. In Caenorhabditis elegans, the "Myc interaction network" consists of two opposing heterodimeric complexes with antagonistic functions in transcriptional control: the Myc-Mondo:Mlx transcriptional activation complex and the Mad:Max transcriptional repression complex. In C. elegans, Mondo, Mlx, Mad, and Max are encoded by mml-1, mxl-2, mdl-1, and mxl-1, respectively. Here we show a similar antagonistic role for the C. elegans Myc-Mondo and Mad complexes in longevity control. Loss of mml-1 or mxl-2 shortens C. elegans lifespan. In contrast, loss of mdl-1 or mxl-1 increases longevity, dependent upon MML-1:MXL-2. The MML-1:MXL-2 and MDL-1:MXL-1 complexes function in both the insulin signaling and dietary restriction pathways. Furthermore, decreased insulin-like/IGF-1 signaling (ILS) or conditions of dietary restriction increase the accumulation of MML-1, consistent with the notion that the Myc family members function as sensors of metabolic status. Additionally, we find that Myc family members are regulated by distinct mechanisms, which would allow for integrated control of gene expression from diverse signals of metabolic status. We compared putative target genes based on ChIP-sequencing data in the modENCODE project and found significant overlap in genomic DNA binding between the major effectors of ILS (DAF-16/FoxO), DR (PHA-4/FoxA), and Myc family (MDL-1/Mad/Mxd) at common target genes, which suggests that diverse signals of metabolic status converge on overlapping transcriptional programs that influence aging. Consistent with this, there is over-enrichment at these common targets for genes that function in lifespan, stress response, and carbohydrate metabolism. Additionally, we find that Myc family members are also involved in stress response and the maintenance of protein homeostasis. Collectively, these findings indicate that Myc family members integrate diverse signals of metabolic status, to coordinate overlapping metabolic and cytoprotective transcriptional programs that determine the progression of aging.

Aging and the age-associated decline of the proteome is determined in part through neuronal control of evolutionarily conserved transcriptional effectors, which safeguard homeostasis under fluctuating metabolic and stress conditions by regulating an expansive proteostatic network. We have discovered the Caenorhabditis elegans homeodomain-interacting protein kinase (HPK-1) acts as a key transcriptional effector to preserve neuronal integrity, function, and proteostasis during aging. Loss of hpk-1 results in drastic dysregulation in expression of neuronal genes, including genes associated with neuronal aging. During normal aging hpk-1 expression increases throughout the nervous system more broadly than any other kinase. Within the aging nervous system, hpk-1 induction overlaps with key longevity transcription factors, which suggests that hpk-1 expression mitigates natural age-associated physiological decline. Consistently, pan-neuronal overexpression of hpk-1 extends longevity, preserves proteostasis both within and outside of the nervous system, and improves stress resistance. Neuronal HPK-1 improves proteostasis through kinase activity. HPK-1 functions cell non-autonomously within serotonergic and γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA)ergic neurons to improve proteostasis in distal tissues by specifically regulating distinct components of the proteostatic network. Increased serotonergic HPK-1 enhances the heat shock response and survival to acute stress. In contrast, GABAergic HPK-1 induces basal autophagy and extends longevity, which requires mxl-2 (MLX), hlh-30 (TFEB), and daf-16 (FOXO). Our work establishes hpk-1 as a key neuronal transcriptional regulator critical for preservation of neuronal function during aging. Further, these data provide novel insight as to how the nervous system partitions acute and chronic adaptive response pathways to delay aging by maintaining organismal homeostasis.

An extensive proteostatic network comprised of molecular chaperones and protein clearance mechanisms functions collectively to preserve the integrity and resiliency of the proteome. The efficacy of this network deteriorates during aging, coinciding with many clinical manifestations, including protein aggregation diseases of the nervous system. A decline in proteostasis can be delayed through the activation of cytoprotective transcriptional responses, which are sensitive to environmental stress and internal metabolic and physiological cues. The homeodomain-interacting protein kinase (hipk) family members are conserved transcriptional co-factors that have been implicated in both genotoxic and metabolic stress responses from yeast to mammals. We demonstrate that constitutive expression of the sole Caenorhabditis elegans Hipk homolog, hpk-1, is sufficient to delay aging, preserve proteostasis, and promote stress resistance, while loss of hpk-1 is deleterious to these phenotypes. We show that HPK-1 preserves proteostasis and extends longevity through distinct but complementary genetic pathways defined by the heat shock transcription factor (HSF-1), and the target of rapamycin complex 1 (TORC1). We demonstrate that HPK-1 antagonizes sumoylation of HSF-1, a post-translational modification associated with reduced transcriptional activity in mammals. We show that inhibition of sumoylation by RNAi enhances HSF-1-dependent transcriptional induction of chaperones in response to heat shock. We find that hpk-1 is required for HSF-1 to induce molecular chaperones after thermal stress and enhances hormetic extension of longevity. We also show that HPK-1 is required in conjunction with HSF-1 for maintenance of proteostasis in the absence of thermal stress, protecting against the formation of polyglutamine (Q35::YFP) protein aggregates and associated locomotory toxicity. These functions of HPK-1/HSF-1 undergo rapid down-regulation once animals reach reproductive maturity. We show that HPK-1 fortifies proteostasis and extends longevity by an additional independent mechanism: induction of autophagy. HPK-1 is necessary for induction of autophagosome formation and autophagy gene expression in response to dietary restriction (DR) or inactivation of TORC1. The autophagy-stimulating transcription factors pha-4/FoxA and mxl-2/Mlx, but not hlh-30/TFEB or the nuclear hormone receptor nhr-62, are necessary for extended longevity resulting from HPK-1 overexpression. HPK-1 expression is itself induced by transcriptional mechanisms after nutritional stress, and post-transcriptional mechanisms in response to thermal stress. Collectively our results position HPK-1 at a central regulatory node upstream of the greater proteostatic network, acting at the transcriptional level by promoting protein folding via chaperone expression, and protein turnover via expression of autophagy genes. HPK-1 therefore provides a promising intervention point for pharmacological agents targeting the protein homeostasis system as a means of preserving robust longevity.