Examining the role of circadian rhythms in ageing

A £4.4m grant has been awarded for the new CircadiAgeing Research programme that will investigate the role of circadian rhythms in healthy ageing.

The CircadiAgeing project will explore how disruptions in circadian rhythms, the natural 24-hour cycles of physiological and behavioural patterns, contribute to ageing and related health issues.

Focusing on both the molecular clock and the less understood membrane-based mechanisms that mediate daily changes in cell excitability, this project aims to uncover how these clocks weaken synergistically with age, impacting our overall health.

Using interdisciplinary methods including genetic analysis and computational biology, the research team hopes to develop interventions that could restore the robustness of these biological clocks, promoting healthier ageing and potentially reducing age-related disorders.

The programme received funding from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) sLoLa (strategic Longer and Larger grant) scheme, which supports teams in pursuing ambitious, multidisciplinary team-based bioscience research.

Professor James Hodge from the University of Bristol who is leading the project, said: “Circadian rhythms or the 24-hour body clock is fundamentally important for life and is conserved from fruit flies to mice and humans.

“Circadian rhythms become weaker as we age leading to poorer sleep and contributing to diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease.

“This BBSRC strategic larger and longer grant marks a major investment of UKRI supporting researchers at Bristol, Exeter, Imperial, Kings and Manchester to investigate exactly how ageing affects circadian rhythms.

“We will take advantage of the powerful genetics and short lifespan of the fruit fly to determine the effect of age on the clock translating our finding to a nocturnal, and for the first time, a day active species of rodent using closely aligned computational models, innovative tools and protocols developed by our labs.

“We will employ, a holistic approach taking a multiple-disciplinary approach to understanding how the circadian clock works at every level across the whole life course. Finally, we will investigate evolutionary conserved interventions to rejuvenate rhythms and behaviour extending health during ageing, revealing ways to potentially allow our ageing population to continue to live well and independently.”

The CircadiAgeing project is one of four research projects which have received a share of more than £20m funding from the BBSRC through the sLoLa scheme.

Professor Anne Ferguson-Smith, BBSRC executive chair, said: “Long-term discovery research is crucial for pioneering significant scientific advancements. This highly collaborative field requires world-leading researchers and research technical professionals to unite and leverage their interdisciplinary skills to answer some of life’s most fundamental questions.

“By investing in these four ambitious projects, we champion the value of team science. This approach is instrumental not only in advancing our scientific understanding but also in propelling us towards groundbreaking discoveries that have the potential to make a real impact on our global society.”

The programme is funded for 60 months and is a collaboration between professor James Hodge of University of Bristol, Dr Mino Belle of University of Manchester, Dr Marco Brancaccio of Imperial College London, professor Hugh Piggins of University of Bristol, professor Krasi Tsanova-Atananova of University of Exeter, and Dr Alessio Vagnoni of King’s College London.