Project description
European training programme on ageing regulation mechanisms
Ageing is a natural process that leads to increased vulnerability to diseases, affecting the quality of life. The complexity of the ageing process and a shortage of scientific models have hindered hypothesis-driven approaches to understanding the molecular basis of ageing, especially in mammals. Funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the HealthAge project aims to create a European training and research programme on lifespan regulation mechanisms in development and disease. HealthAge will combine the training of 15 young scientists with a series of short-term research objectives achievable within the duration of the project. The research goals will focus on lifespan regulation mechanisms, longevity assurance pathways in development and disease, and novel approaches against age-related diseases and progeria.
Objective
Aging is an inexorable homeostatic failure of complex but largely unknown aetiology that leads to increased vulnerability to disease with enormous consequences on the quality of individual lives and the overall cost to society. Although, aging is driven by limitations in somatic maintenance, it is also subject to regulation by evolutionarily highly conserved molecular pathways. Indeed, macromolecular damage may drive the functional decline with aging; however, a battery of conserved, longevity assurance mechanisms may set the pace on how rapidly damage builds up and function is lost over time. Human efforts over the last centuries have succeeded in substantially lengthening lifespan, allowing aging to become a common feature of western societies. However, The discouraging complexity of the aging process, the noticeable lack of tools to study it, and a shortage of experimentally tractable model systems have made it significantly challenging to unravel the molecular basis of the processes that cause loss of bodily functions and degeneration of cells and tissues with advancing age. HealthAge was carefully designed to create a joint European program of excellence in training and research with a core intellectual focus on the functional role of “Lifespan Regulation Mechanisms in Health and Disease”. To tackle this, HealthAge combines top-level, state-of-the-art and interdisciplinary research skills that range from basic molecular mechanisms and ‘omics’ level understanding to translational research and clinical applications. This interdisciplinary strategy will allow us to gain functional insight into the fundamental mechanisms regulating longevity as well as to develop a series of rationalized intervention strategies aimed at counteracting age-related diseases.
Keywords
Programme(s)
Coordinator
70013 Irakleio
Greece
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Participants (14)
50937 Koeln
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1015 Lausanne
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08028 Barcelona
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35122 Padova
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75794 Paris
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69978 Tel Aviv
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9713 GZ Groningen
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Participation ended
38700 La Tronche
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
33100 Tampere
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
Participation ended
1015 Ecublens
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
166 75 GLYFADA
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
4051 Basel
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1015 LAUSANNE
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1015 Lausanne
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
Partners (5)
Partner organisations contribute to the implementation of the action, but do not sign the Grant Agreement.
34136 Trieste
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Partner organisations contribute to the implementation of the action, but do not sign the Grant Agreement.
50931 Koln
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Partner organisations contribute to the implementation of the action, but do not sign the Grant Agreement.
74100 Rethimno
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Partner organisations contribute to the implementation of the action, but do not sign the Grant Agreement.
1211 Geneve
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Partner organisations contribute to the implementation of the action, but do not sign the Grant Agreement.
70013 Heraklion
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