Shorter telomere length with age in the loggerhead turtle

We verified whether telomere length shortens with age in the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) by measuring telomere lengths (relative telomere to single copy gene [T/S] ratios) in whole blood and epidermis from 20 captive individuals with a real-time PCR method. There was no significant corre...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inGenes & genetic systems Vol. 83; no. 5; p. 423
Main Authors Hatase, Hideo, Sudo, Ryusuke, K. Watanabe, Kunihiro, Kasugai, Takashi, Saito, Tomomi, Okamoto, Hitoshi, Uchida, Itaru, Tsukamoto, Katsumi
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Mishima Japan Science and Technology Agency 01.09.2008
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Summary:We verified whether telomere length shortens with age in the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta) by measuring telomere lengths (relative telomere to single copy gene [T/S] ratios) in whole blood and epidermis from 20 captive individuals with a real-time PCR method. There was no significant correlation between age and relative T/S ratios in blood. Although the correlation between age and relative T/S ratios in epidermis was not significant, older turtles had smaller relative T/S ratios in epidermis. It was thus demonstrated that telomere length in epidermis could be a useful age estimator for sea turtles. Relative age information obtained with this simple, rapid, non-invasive technique may help to advance our understanding of the ecology of endangered sea turtles. This is the first publication on age-related changes in telomere length among chelonians.
ISSN:1341-7568
1880-5779