Characterization of molecular mechanisms governing budding yeast lifespan using small peptides that interact with the Anaphase Promoting Complex

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Evidence is accumulating that cellular lifespan correlates to its damage repair capacity. Genetic screens in model organisms, from yeast to flies, have consistently demonstrated that genes involved in stress response networks play a decisive role in lifespan determination. Using the brewing yeast model system, we have shown that regulated cell cycle progression is tightly linked with stress response and normal longevity. Our work characterizing the Anaphase Promoting Complex (APC) in yeast, a large highly conserved complex of proteins required for the targeting of substrates for ubiquitin-dependent degradation, has described a number of novel roles and substrates for the APC. The APC is largely known to target proteins that inhibit mitotic progression and G1 maintenance for degradation. Our studies over the past 15 years, many of them NSERC funded, have shown that the APC is also required for mitotic histone deposition and post-translational modifications, stress response, genomic stability, and lifespan. Our work therefore suggests that the APC plays a central and critical role in maintaining cell vigor and ultimately lifespan,