【Animal Modeling】-Drosophila Model and the Genetic Mechanism of Heart Aging

  The development of modern biomedicine has entered the era of precision medicine. The impact of human genes and their mutations on disease phenotypes and treatment responses is one of the basis for targeted diagnosis and drug-targeted therapy. Through the function of related genes and their genetic variations Research to achieve precision medicine for different groups of people. The study of human genes and their functions is the key to the development of precision medicine, and model animals are powerful tools for the study of gene functions.

  As a classic model organism, Drosophila is a good material for genetic research. In addition to its short life span and easy reproduction and cultivation, its advantage lies in the completion of the whole genome sequence analysis and accumulation of a large number of genetic research methods. Through related genetic methods and technologies, we can almost overexpression and suppress expression or knockout of any gene in Drosophila in specific time and space, so as to easily observe and analyze the biological function of a gene in vivo. From a genetic point of view, although mammals are closely related to Drosophila, most of the genes related to signal transduction pathways in Drosophila and mammals are conserved, and there are often multiple copies of a gene in mammals, but There is usually only one copy in Drosophila, which provides the possibility and great convenience for using Drosophila as a model organism to study the function of mammalian genes.

  The aging of the population has continuously increased the number of deaths from cardiovascular diseases worldwide. Cardiac aging is an important factor in the occurrence of cardiovascular diseases in the elderly, and it is considered to be a harmful decline in cardiac function. In mammals, cardiac function decline is accompanied by many age-related changes, such as a decrease in the number of cardiomyocytes, left ventricular hypertrophy, fibrosis, and collagen accumulation. Cardiac aging leads to increased cardiovascular mortality and morbidity in the elderly. Therefore, the research on the mechanism of cardiac aging is becoming more and more important. With the rapid development of genetics and molecular biology, the research on the mechanism of cardiac aging has made great progress. Many genes that control heart development have been shown to be conserved in Drosophila and mammals. For example, the vertebrate homologous gene Nkx2.5 of the tinman gene in Drosophila was first discovered, which has been shown to control mouse heart development. The adult Drosophila heart has been used to study the function and aging of the heart. At the same time, fruit flies have an open circulatory system, with a linear heart tube located in the abdomen on the dorsal midline, and an aorta extending up to the head. Three sets of internal valves divide the abdominal heart into a front conical cavity and three posterior chambers. , Each of the four heart chambers contains an outer valve that allows hemolymph to enter the heart during diastole. Because fruit flies use a catheter system to transport oxygen directly to tissues, heart function is not as closely related to survival as vertebrates. Therefore, fruit flies can withstand more serious genetic changes in cardiac physiology than mammals, similar to vertebrate heart models. The aging of the heart of fruit flies can also be studied by giving drug stimulation. These developmental characteristics and genetic advantages make this model of Drosophila very suitable for the study of pathophysiology and genetics of cardiac aging. This article will review the research of Drosophila model in the genetic mechanism of cardiac aging.