ArticleAmerican journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council
Blood cell telomere lengths and shortening rates of chimpanzee and human females.
Article in American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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14 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 26 citations in OpenAlex.
- Telomere length analysis from minimally-invasively collected samples: Methods development and meta-analysis of the validity of different sampling techniques: American Journal of Human Biology.American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council · 2021Pooled it
- Defying Expectations: Extended Lifespan and Age-Related Telomere Dynamics in the Tropical Bat Species,Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- The influence of perceived stress and motivation on telomere length among NCAA swimmers.American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council · 2024Article
- Dataset generated in a systematic review and meta-analysis of biological clocks as age estimation markers in animal ecology.Data in brief · 2023Article
- Polycystic ovary syndrome and leukocyte telomere length: cross-sectional and longitudinal changes.European journal of endocrinology · 2022Article
- Life Expectancy in Marine Mammals Is Unrelated to Telomere Length but Is Associated With Body Size.Frontiers in genetics · 2021Article
- Genetics and geography of leukocyte telomere length in sub-Saharan Africans.Human molecular genetics · 2020Article
- Telomere shortening rate predicts species life span.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2019Article
- Paternal and grandpaternal ages at conception and descendant telomere lengths in chimpanzees and humans.American journal of physical anthropology · 2017Article
- Article
- Genomic evidence for the evolution of human postmenopausal longevity.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2016Article
- Method Specific Calibration Corrects for DNA Extraction Method Effects on Relative Telomere Length Measurements by Quantitative PCR.PloS one · 2016Article
- On the apparent rarity of epithelial cancers in captive chimpanzees.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2015Review
- Article
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4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
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Abstract
objectivesSlower rates of aging distinguish humans from our nearest living cousins. Chimpanzees rarely survive their forties while large fractions of women are postmenopausal even in high-mortality hunter-gatherer populations. Cellular and molecular mechanisms for these somatic aging differences remain to be identified, though telomeres might play a role. To find out, we compared telomere lengths across age-matched samples of female chimpanzees and women.
methodsWe used a monochrome multiplex quantitative polymerase chain reaction to assay canonical telomere repeats in blood cells from captive female chimpanzees (65 individuals; age: 6.2-56.7 years) and compared them to the same measure in human females (43 individuals; age: 7.4-57.3 years).
resultsOur samples showed little difference in attrition rates between the species (~0.022 T/S per year for chimpanzees and ~0.012 T/S per year for humans with overlapping 95% confidence intervals), but telomeres were twice as long in chimpanzees as in humans (T/S ratios = 2.70 and 1.26, respectively).
conclusionsBased on the longevity differences, we initially hypothesized that telomere shortening rates would be faster in chimpanzees than in humans. Instead, it is shorter telomere length that appears to be the derived state in humans. This comparison indicates that better characterization of physiological aging in our closest living relatives will be indispensable for understanding the evolution of distinctive human longevity.
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