Lifespan decrease in a Caenorhabditis elegans mutant lacking TRX‐1, a thioredoxin expressed in ASJ sensory neurons

Abstract

22 páginas, 4 figuras.Thioredoxins are a class of small proteins that play a key role in regulating many cellular redox processes. We report here the characterization of the first member of the thioredoxin family in metazoans that is mainly associated with neurons. The Caenorhabditis elegans gene B0228.5 encodes a thioredoxin (TRX-1) that is expressed in ASJ ciliated sensory neurons, and to some extent also in the posterior-most intestinal cells. TRX-1 is active at reducing protein disulfides in the presence of a heterologous thioredoxin reductase. A mutant worm strain carrying a null allele of the trx-1 gene displays a reproducible decrease in both mean and maximum lifespan when compared to wild-type. The identification and characterization of TRX-1 paves the way to use C. elegans as an in vivo model to study the role of thioredoxins in lifespan and nervous system physiology and pathology.This work was supported by a Ramón y Cajal contract from the Spanish Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia to A.M.-V., by grants from the Swedish Research Council and from the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research (SSF) to P.S. and by a fellowship from the Austrian Academy of Sciences to G.G. Some nematode strains used in this work were provided by the Caenorhabditis Genetics Center, which is funded by the NIH National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), and by the C. elegans Community Gene Knock-Out Consortium.Peer reviewe