Characterization of adipose tissue-to-muscle communication pathways in aging
Our organs coordinate numerous biological processes including metabolism, growth, reproduction, and muscle activity to facilitate physiological processes in health and disease. This is achieved through communication networks involving proteins secreted from a specific organ into the blood where they can then traffic to and act on distal tissues. Intriguingly, aging significantly impacts these interorgan communications networks, and vice versa. Despite this, the mechanistic basis of aging-dependent declines in interorgan communication remain poorly defined. To address this, Dr. Droujinine has developed a platform in which all proteins that are secreted from a specific organ are labeled, allowing the key proteins that are involved in interorgan communication to be identified in another organ. Using this method, Dr. Droujinine will define how aging impacts secretion of proteins, and the specific tissues impacted by altered interorgan signaling mediated through secreted factors. Together, this establishes a new strategy to broadly define aging-dependent changes in whole-body interorgan networks.
