Telomere Length Measurement by Quantitative Real-time PCR: A Molecular Marker for Human Age Prediction

Abstract

The fact that telomere shortening occurs with aging leads to the hypothesis that a correlation could be made between Telomere Length (TL) and suspect age. This study aimed to assess if TL can be used as an investigational tool to predict human age through developing a formula based on this correlation with accuracy suitable to be applied in forensic practice. A quantitative real-time PCR study was carried out on 80 Egyptians, ranging in age from 1-79 years. The results confirmed that the relative TL significantly shortened with aging; "r" = -0.903 (p<0.001). The human age could be determined by the following formula: (Y = 66.9-28X), (Y: Age in years; X: Relative TL), with a regression analysis between relative TL and age had an R 2 = 0.815. The standard error of age estimate was ±10.14 years. The present study concluded that estimation of human age based on the relative TL measured by quantitative real-time PCR may be a useful method for age prediction, especially when there is no morphologic information in the biological samples, but the estimated standard error of age prediction in this study was quite high (±10 years) to be used with certainty in forensic investigations. Inter-individual variations in TL and variability among the gender must be also considered when applying this method. So, this method could only give a rough estimation of age and it may be a complementary method for age estimation from soft tissues.

Preterm labor in the absence of acute histologic chorioamnionitis is characterized by cellular senescence of the chorioamniotic membranes

“…In both scenarios, such a characteristic has been considered a marker of cellular senescence 35, 63 . Relative telomere length was determined using two established methods 34, 45, 46 in the chorioamniotic membranes from the four study groups. The validation of the relative telomere length methods showed that both sets of primers are able to detect senescent cells: the older individual had a shorter telomere length than the younger individual (Supplementary Figure 2).…”

“…Relative telomere length was also measured in the same samples using a different qPCR method and primers 34, 46 . The primers (hereafter referred to as “Primer Set#2”) used to amplify the telomere region were the following: forward (5′-CGG TTTGTTTGGGTTTGGGTTTGGGTTTGGGTTTGGGTT-3′) (200nM) and reverse (5′-GGCTTGCCTTACCCTTACCCTTACCCTTACCCTTACCCT-3′) (200nM).…”