Dietary unsaturated fatty acid metabolites modulate life span and health span of C. elegans

Abstract

Dietary unsaturated fatty acids are essential to physiology in different organisms. However, their mechanism remains largely unknown. Recent studies showed that the downstream metabolites play a critical role in inflammation, blood pressure regulation, pain perception, carcinogenesis, wound healing, and tissue and neural repair. However, their role in lifespan and healthspan in mammals remain largely unknown. To study the role and associated mechanism on the effect of unsaturated fatty acid metabolites on lifespan and healthspan in organism, we use C. elegans as a model organism because of the following reasons: 1) It is genetically close to humans; 2) the genome is known; 3) genetic modification is relatively easy; 4) imaging C. elegans is relatively easy, and more importantly, 5) part of the unsaturated fatty acid metabolism is conserved between humans and C. elegans. In this presentation, we will present the effect of cytochrome P450 metabolites on lifespan and healthspan on C. elegans and will discuss the potential mechanism behind such effects.Support or Funding InformationThis work was supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) R00 ES024806. This work was also supported by National Science Foundation DMS‐1761320.