In C. elegans, removal of the germline extends lifespan significantly. We demonstrate that the nuclear hormone receptor, NHR-49, enables the response to this physiological change by increasing the expression of genes involved in mitochondrial β-oxidation and fatty-acid desaturation. The coordinated augmentation of these processes is critical for germline-less animals to maintain their lipid stores and to sustain de novo fat synthesis during adulthood. Following germline ablation, NHR-49 is up-regulated in somatic cells by the conserved longevity determinants DAF-16/FOXO and TCER-1/TCERG1. Accordingly, NHR-49 overexpression in fertile animals extends their lifespan modestly. In fertile adults, nhr-49 expression is DAF-16/FOXO and TCER-1/TCERG1 independent although its depletion causes age-related lipid abnormalities. Our data provide molecular insights into how reproductive stimuli are integrated into global metabolic changes to alter the lifespan of the animal. They suggest that NHR-49 may facilitate the adaptation to loss of reproductive potential through synchronized enhancement of fatty-acid oxidation and desaturation, thus breaking down some fats ordained for reproduction and orchestrating a lipid profile conducive for somatic maintenance and longevity.

Three-dimensional (3D) engineered tissue constructs are a novel and promising approach to tissue repair and regeneration. 3D tissue constructs have the ability to restore form and function to damaged soft tissue unlike previous methods, such as plastic surgery, which are able to restore only form, leaving the function of the soft tissue often compromised. In this study, we seeded murine myoblasts (C2C12) into a collagen composite scaffold and cultured the scaffold in a roller bottle cell culture system in order to create a 3D tissue graft in vitro. The 3D graft created in vitro was then utilized to investigate muscle tissue repair in vivo. The 3D muscle grafts were implanted into defect sites created in the skeletal muscles in mice. We detected that the scaffolds degraded slowly over time, and muscle healing was improved which was shown by an increased quantity of innervated and vascularized regenerated muscle fibers. Our results suggest that the collagen composite scaffold seeded with myoblasts can create a 3D muscle graft in vitro that can be employed for defect muscle tissue repair in vivo.

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Here, we present the proteomics dataset of young and middle-aged Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) exposed to Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa strain PA01), which is related to the article "Proteomic Identification of Virulence-Related Factors in Young and Aging C. elegans infected with Pseudomonas aeruginosa" (C. D. King et. al, in-revisions). This dataset was generated to better understand the effects of aging on molecular mechanisms involved in host response to pathogen exposure. Protein from C. elegans of different age and exposure to P. aeruginosa PA01 or control E. coli OP50 were extracted and tryptically digested. Peptides were labeled with the reagents tandem mass tag (TMT6-plex), separated, and detected by using offline strong-cation exchange and online liquid chromatography – mass spectrometry (SCX – LC – MS/MS & MS3). A separate mixture of peptides were labeled on N-terminal amines and lysines with dimethylation. Dimethylated peptides were analyzed using LC – MS/MS and a portion of the results were used to verify fold-change direction for TMT6-plex experiments. Raw data can be found online at www.CHORUSproject.org, a cloud-based data repository (see specifications table for details).