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Age-independent telomere shortening and ion-channel defects in SCD

Nature Reviews Cardiology volume 10, page 362 (2013)Cite this article

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In the Review article by Fyhrquist et al. (The roles of senescence and telomere shortening in cardiovascular disease. Nat. Rev. Cardiol. doi:10.1038/nrcardio.2013.30),1 the authors extensively appraise the role in cardiovascular diseases of telomere length homeostasis in response to senescence, oxidative stress, and various other factors. The measurement of leukocyte telomere length to determine telomere size might be an important biomarker to predict cardiac disease outcomes. We agree with most of the conclusions of the authors in this Review and wish to add a new dimension by proposing a possible mechanism by which chronic oxidative stress in the cardiac microenvironment, as a result of ion-channel defects, might cause telomere shortening, which supports the hypothesis of arrhythmia-induced cardiac dysfunction.2

We previously reported the direct correlation between telomere length attrition and sudden cardiac death (SCD) using the processes of leukocyte-telomere-length measurement and comparative genomic hybridization. This analysis revealed defects in key ion-channel genes that had a strong correlation with telomere attrition when compared with age-matched controls.2 Fyhrquist and colleagues reviewed some work on the role of the mitochondria in cardiovascular disease, but ion channels—which have a crucial role in maintaining cellular homeostasis, particularly in the heart—were not discussed.

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References

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Acknowledgements

B. Banerjee is funded by the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Government of India for his work on molecular stress biology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Molecular Stress and Stem Cell Biology Group, School of Biotechnology, Campus XI, KIIT University, Bhubaneswar, 751024, Odisha, India

    Birendranath Banerjee

  2. Department of Physiology, Genome Stability Laboratory, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, MD6, Level 14 South Core, 117597, Singapore

    M. Prakash Hande

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  1. Birendranath Banerjee
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  2. M. Prakash Hande
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Correspondence to Birendranath Banerjee.

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Banerjee, B., Hande, M. Age-independent telomere shortening and ion-channel defects in SCD. Nat Rev Cardiol 10, 362 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrcardio.2013.30-c1

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