Abstract
Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) is an essential molecule involved in various metabolic reactions, acting as an electron donor in the electron transport chain and as a co‐factor for NAD+ ‐dependent enzymes. In the early 2000s, reports that NAD+ declines with aging introduced the notion that NAD+ metabolism is globally and progressively impaired with age. Since then, NAD+ became an attractive target for potential pharmacological therapies aiming to increase NAD+ levels to promote vitality and protect against age‐related diseases. This review summarizes and discusses a collection of studies that report the levels of NAD+ with aging in different species (i.e., yeast, C. elegans, rat, mouse, monkey, and human), to determine whether the notion that overall NAD+ levels decrease with aging stands true. We find that, despite systematic claims of overall changes in NAD+ levels with aging, the evidence to support such claims is very limited and often restricted to a single tissue or cell type. This is particularly true in humans, where the development of NAD+ levels during aging is still poorly characterized. There is a need for much larger, preferably longitudinal, studies to assess how NAD+ levels develop with aging in various tissues. This will strengthen our conclusions on NAD metabolism during aging and should provide a foundation for better pharmacological targeting of relevant tissues.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 101 |
Journal | Nutrients |
Volume | 14 |
Issue number | 1 |
ISSN | 2072-6643 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2021 by the author. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
Keywords
- Aging
- C. elegans
- Human
- Monkey
- Mouse
- NAD
- Rat
- Yeast