High-Content C. elegans Screen Identifies Natural Compounds Impacting Mitochondria-Lipid Homeostasis and Promoting Healthspan.

The aging process is concurrently shaped by genetic and extrinsic factors. In this work, we screened a small library of natural compounds, many of marine origin, to identify novel possible anti-aging interventions in Caenorhabditis elegans, a powerful model organism for aging studies. To this aim, we exploited a high-content microscopy platform to search for interventions able to induce phenotypes associated with mild mitochondrial stress, which is known to promote animal's health- and lifespan. Worms were initially exposed to three different concentrations of the drugs in liquid culture, in search of those affecting animal size and expression of mitochondrial stress response genes. This was followed by a validation step with nine compounds on solid media to refine compounds concentration, which led to the identification of four compounds (namely isobavachalcone, manzamine A, kahalalide F and lutein) consistently affecting development, fertility, size and lipid content of the nematodes. Treatment of Drosophila cells with the four hits confirmed their effects on mitochondria activity and lipid content. Out of these four, two were specifically chosen for analysis of age-related parameters, kahalalide F and lutein, which conferred increased resistance to heat and oxidative stress and extended animals' healthspan. We also found that, out of different mitochondrial stress response genes, only the C. elegans ortholog of the synaptic regulatory proteins neuroligins, nlg-1, was consistently induced by the two compounds and mediated lutein healthspan effects.

C. elegans screening strategies to identify pro-longevity interventions.

Drugs screenings in search of enhancers or suppressors of selected readout(s) are nowadays mainly carried out in single cells systems. These approaches are however limited when searching for compounds with effects at the organismal level. To overcome this drawback the use of different model organisms to carry out modifier screenings has exponentially grown in the past decade. Unique characteristics such as easy manageability, low cost, fast reproductive cycle, short lifespan, simple anatomy and genetic amenability, make the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans especially suitable for this purpose. Here we briefly review the different high-throughput and high-content screenings which exploited the nematode to identify new compounds extending healthy lifespan. In this context, we describe our recently developed screening strategy to search for pro-longevity interventions taking advantage of the very reproducible phenotypes observed in C. elegans upon different degrees of mitochondrial stress. Indeed, in Mitochondrial mutants, the processes induced to cope with mild mitochondrial alterations during development, and ultimately extending animal lifespan, lead to reduced size and induction of specific stress responses. Instead, upon strong mitochondrial dysfunction, worms arrest their development. Exploiting these automatically quantifiable phenotypic readouts, we developed a new screening approach using the Cellomics ArrayScanVTI-HCS Reader and identified a new pro-longevity drug.

An automated phenotype-based microscopy screen to identify pro-longevity interventions acting through mitochondria in C. elegans.

Mitochondria are multifunctional organelles that play a central role in cellular homeostasis. Severe mitochondrial dysfunction leads to life-threatening diseases in humans and accelerates the aging process. Surprisingly, moderate reduction of mitochondrial function in different species has anti-aging effects. High-throughput screenings in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans lead to the identification of several pro-longevity genetic and pharmacological interventions. Large-scale screens, however, are manual, subjective, time consuming and costly. These limitations could be reduced by the identification of automatically quantifiable biomarkers of healthy aging. In this study we exploit the distinct and reproducible phenotypes described in C. elegans upon different levels of mitochondrial alteration to develop an automated high-content strategy to identify new potential pro-longevity interventions. Utilizing the microscopy platform Cellomics ArrayScan Reader, we optimize a workflow to automatically and reliably quantify the discrete phenotypic readouts associated with different degrees of silencing of mitochondrial respiratory chain regulatory proteins, and validate the approach with mitochondrial-targeting drugs known to extend lifespan in C. elegans. Finally, we report that a new mitochondrial ATPase modulator matches our screening phenotypic criteria and extends nematode's lifespan thus providing the proof of principle that our strategy could be exploited to identify novel mitochondrial-targeted drugs with pro-longevity activity. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Mitochondrial Dysfunction in Aging.