Counteracting age-related VEGF signaling insufficiency promotes healthy aging and extends life span

• DOI: 10.1126/science.abc8479
• Publication Date: 2021-07-29T19:06:09Z
• Authors: M. Grunewald; S. Kumar; H. Sharife; E. Volinsky; A. Gileles-Hillel; T. Licht; A. Permyakova; L. Hinden; S. Azar; Y. Friedmann; P. Kupetz; R. Tzuberi; A. Anisimov; K. Alitalo; M. Horwitz; S. Leebhoff; O. Z. Khoma; R. Hlushchuk; V. Djonov; R. Abramovitch; J. Tam; E. Keshet
• Keywords: Senescence; Life span

Aging is an established risk factor for vascular diseases, but aging itself may contribute to the progressive deterioration of organ function. Here, we show in aged mice that endothelial growth (VEGF) signaling insufficiency, which caused by increased production decoy receptors, drive physiological across multiple systems. Increasing VEGF prevented age-associated capillary loss, improved perfusion and function, extended life span. Healthier was evidenced favorable metabolism body composition amelioration aging-associated pathologies including hepatic steatosis, sarcopenia, osteoporosis, "inflammaging" (age-related multiorgan chronic inflammation), tumor burden. These results indicate insufficiency affects suggest modulating this pathway result mammalian span overall health.