Early life experiences shape later life health

About the Lecture:
Human populations are getting older. Older age is associated with a broad functional decline and increased susceptibility to disease. But what determines how we age? Most of the variation in human longevity is due to environment. Intriguingly, environments encountered throughout our life appear to shape our old age. We have been using the fruit fly to understand how conditions encountered in youth impact later-life health. Our recent findings point to persistent changes in gene expression as a mechanism linking early experiences with later health. Such understanding of the biology of ageing may provide us with the means to improve human health in older ages.
About the speaker:
Dr Nazif Alic is an Associate Professor at the UCL Institute of Healthy Ageing. The work in his laboratory aims to understand how the ageing process can be modified, specifically though changes in gene expression.