Elucidating novel roles of selective autophagy in inflammation during ageing

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Global human population over the age of 60 will increase more than threefold (to nearly 2 billion individuals) during the first half of the twenty-first century, and that by 2050 it will exceed the size of the global population of young individuals (those individuals who are less than 15 years of age). For the first time in history, there are 11 million people aged 65 or over in the UK and also there are more pensioners than there are children under 16. Ageing population puts an enormous pressure on health care and pension system. Thus, understanding the biology of ageing is an urgently required task in order to ensure a viable and sustainable future for our human community.One of the phenotypic hallmarks of ageing cells is chronic, systemic inflammation in the absence of any apparent infection, and is a significant risk factor for mortality in the elderly. We discovered that a protein called Kenny, which participates in the control of inflammation, is selectively degraded by a cellular process called autophagy. Autophagy, which means 'self-eating', is an essential process that involves the degradation of cytoplasmic material. Cells use autophagy to generate materials and energy when conditions become unfavourable. They also use this process to clear damaged cellular components or specific proteins in order to abolish their function when it is not needed in the cell. We will use the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster as a genetically modifiable model organism to understand at the molecular level how selective autophagy regulates inflammation during ageing. These mechanisms are very similar between fruit flies and humans, so the results will have direct relevance to human health.This project will make a major contribution to our understanding of the fundamental mechanisms of autophagy and inflammation during ageing and could potentially be used in applied research aimed towards developing new strategies to fight age-related diseases and to promote healthy ageing.