Research Perspective|Volume 3, Issue 3|pp 319—324

The implication of Sir2 in replicative aging and senescence in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Cheol Woong Ha¹, Won-Ki Huh

¹School of Biological Sciences, Research Center for Functional Cellulomics, and Institute of Microbiology, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Republic of Korea

Received: March 9, 2011Accepted: March 13, 2011Published: March 13, 2011

Copyright: © 2011 Ha et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

The target of rapamycin (TOR) pathway regulates cell growth and aging in various organisms. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, silent information regulator 2 (Sir2) modulates cellular senescence. Moreover, Sir2 plays a crucial role in promoting ribosomal DNA (rDNA) stability and longevity under TOR inhibition. Here we review the implication of rDNA stabilizers in longevity, discuss how Sir2 stabilizes rDNA under TOR inhibition and speculate on the link between sumoylation and Sir2-related pro-aging pathways.