| Traditional Chinese medicine of tonics is generally used for its potential anti-aging activity. The objective is to evaluate the anti-aging activities of formulas and to clarify their underlying mechanism of anti-aging activities in C. elegans.Based on the research in scavenging free radical and anti-oxidative activities of formulas, eight ones were chosen for this project. For assaying lifespan, the short lifespan mutant of TK22and wild-type N2nematodes were used. Treated the worms with certain concentrations of formulas, respectively, the number of survivors was counted every day and data were analyzed by survival analysis. Mean lifespan and median time were used as the indices on evaluating anti-aging effect. Optimal concentrations of formulas to arouse longevity were chosen for further experiments. Oxidative stress and acute thermal stress were employed, which are closely related to reactive oxygen species. Reproduction capacity was also tested in our experiments.The results showed that WFQ1significantly increased mean lifespan by44.3%in mutant strain TK22and45.7%in wild-type N2. Respectively, WFQ1exerted the actions to enhance the ability of TK22to resistant to oxidative stress as well as to thermal stress. Meanwhile, it showed that N2can be protected by WFQ1from thermal stressor. In addition, compared to the control group, the brood size of N2decreased significantly after treated with WFQ1. This indicates that it reduced the reproductive capacity of N2.WFQ2caused a marked influence on mean lifespan with an increase of12.3%in TK22and38.3%in N2..It is observed that WFQ2enhanced the stress resistance ability of both strains. Moreover, it decreased the reproductive capacity of N2.LW was found to extend mean lifespan significantly by23.3%in TK22and12.6%in N2. It increased the resistance against oxidative stress in TK22and both stressors in N2.Besides, the brood size of N2strain was affected negatively.SQ also resulted in a significant effect with respect to lifespan modulation, which showed an increase of13.1%in TK22and14.5%in N2. It made TK22mutant more adaptive to oxidative stress, whereas SQ kept N2from thermal damage on a lesser degree. TM significantly aroused lifespan prolongation with an increase of26%in TK22. It was not only able to protect TK22against oxidative stress, but also thermal stress.QB and QJ modulated the lifespan of TK22significantly, which represented an increase of15.8%,21.9%. Both of them partly counteracted oxidative stress in TK22. Additionally, QJ showed similar antioxidative effect in N2.Above all, TM, QB and QJ extended lifespan of TK22largely, however they had no influence on N2in our experiment.EC induced obvious longevity of N2by an increment of21.8%. It can develop the ability of N2to cope with the thermal stress, while reduce the number of progeny. Reversely, EC increased the ability to resistant to oxidative stress, but did not affect lifespan of TK22.The eight traditional Chinese formulas used in our experiment showed to be potential therapeutics for anti-aging, and could enhance stress resistance to oxidative and heat stressors. Mutant TK22was generally more sensitive to formulas selected than wild-type N2. It may be due to the formulas containing antioxidant herbs more or less, which could remove the elevated reactive oxygen species in TK22. Possiblely, the formulas we used tended to increase lifespan by anti-oxidizing action in TK22and by promoting resistantance to thermal stress in N2. It is worth mentioning that anti-oxidation agents did not always lead to longevity. Additionally, they also reduce the reproductive capacity of N2rather than that of TK22. In conclusion, our results proved that the anti-aging efficacy and their action mechanism of traditional Chinese formulas we used were different with the animal genetic backgrounds, mutant or wildtype. |
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