Fruit Extracts Upregulate Telomerase Activity and Ameliorate Cell Replicative Senescence.

Anti-aging functional foods benefit the elderly. Telomeres are chromosomal ends that maintain genome stability extended by telomerase catalytic subunit TERT. Due to the end-replication problem, telomeres shorten after each cell cycle without telomerase in most human cells, and eventually the cell enters the senescence stage.

Natural Product Library Screens Identify Sanguinarine Chloride as a Potent Inhibitor of Telomerase Expression and Activity.

Reverse transcriptase hTERT is essential to telomerase function in stem cells, as well as in 85-90% of human cancers. Its high expression in stem cells or cancer cells has made telomerase/hTERT an attractive therapeutic target for anti-aging and anti-tumor applications. In this study, we screened a natural product library containing 800 compounds using an endogenous hTERT reporter.