Click here to close
Hello! We notice that you are using Internet Explorer, which is not supported by Xenbase and may cause the site to display incorrectly.
We suggest using a current version of Chrome,
FireFox, or Safari.
Biol Lett
2025 Feb 26;212:20240626. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2024.0626.
Show Gene links
Show Anatomy links
Telomere dynamics in maturing frogs vary among organs.
Burraco P
,
Metcalfe NB
,
Monaghan P
.
???displayArticle.abstract???
It is important to know whether organs age at the same rate and are equally affected by developmental conditions as this provides insights into causes of ageing. However, data on organ-specific telomere dynamics remain scant. In a previous study of the early life of the amphibian Xenopus laevis, we detected changes in telomere lengths in gut cells, while liver, heart and muscle telomeres were unchanged; larval rearing temperature had minimal effects. Here, we extend that study to examine telomere dynamics in the same four organs and larval temperature treatments from 70-day post-metamorphic juvenile Xenopus through to sexually mature (2-year-old) adults. Telomeres shortened from juvenile to adult in the gut, heart and hindlimb muscle. In contrast, liver telomere lengths did not change with age but were shorter if the early life temperature was warm. Organ telomere lengths were influenced by sex only in adults. Warmer larval temperatures were also associated with longer gut telomeres in juveniles. Hence, pre-metamorphic conditions can influence post-metamorphic telomere dynamics, and telomere loss between juvenile and adult life stages occurs in different organs from those affected earlier in life. These findings indicate the existence of organ-dependent ageing rates across lifetimes, potentially related to developmental and environmental history.
???displayArticle.pubmedLink???
39999893
???displayArticle.pmcLink???PMC11858783 ???displayArticle.link???Biol Lett ???displayArticle.grants???[+]
ERC, Ramón y Cajal Fellowship, Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, European Union
Figure 1. . Variation in relative telomere length (log-transformed) in the (A) gut, (B) heart, (C) liver and (D) muscle of 70-day-old post-metamorphic juveniles and 2-year-old adults of Xenopus laevis that had been reared during the larval period at either 19°C (in blue) or 23°C (in orange). Boxes represent 25th to 75th percentiles, lines within boxes represent median values and vertical lines represent maximum and minimum data values. Lines with asterisks indicate significant differences in telomere length between juveniles and adults. Warmer temperatures at the larval stage resulted in shorter liver telomeres regardless of post-metamorphic life stage and greater reductions in gut telomere length from juvenile to adult (table 1). Drawings are not scaled.
Figure 2. . Telomere dynamics across organs and between sexes in (A) 70-day-old juveniles and (B) 2-year-old adults in Xenopus laevis. Boxes represent 25th to 75th percentiles, lines within boxes represent median values and vertical lines represent maximum and minimum data values. Lines with asterisks indicate significant differences in telomere length between females and males.
Figure 3. . Linear correlations between (log-transformed) gut, liver, heart and muscle telomere lengths within the same individual in (A) 70-day-old and (B) 2-year-old Xenopus laevis frogs. Regression lines are shown when the linear correlation is significant.
Figure S1. Schematic representation of the number of sampled individuals, sample sizes, number of replicate tanks and density at sampling (indicated in the last line of each life stage) across sampling different life stages of Xenopus laevis. Sampling at early life stages (from 54-NF to 7-month) were included in Burraco et al. 2023 (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2022.2448). Boxes highlight the life stages used in the present study. After the 70-day sampling, density was reduced to 3 individuals per tank. After the 7-month sampling, one individual per tank (n=15 in total) was pooled into a 100-L tank (one tank per temperature)
Figure S2. Relationships between telomere length and body mass in 70-day female and male juveniles (A,B), and 2-year female and male adults (C,D) in Xenopus laevis. Note that the relationships between body mass and telomere length were not significant, but regression lines are included to show how there is a tendency at 2 years of age for the relationships to be negative in females but positive in males.
