Tobacco ages the whole body – irreversibly

Lungs, pancreas, thyroid, esophagus or some regions of the brain. FCUP study shows how this happens at the molecular level.

Smoking is bad for your health. Smoking ages the body. We already knew. But now we go to two other levels: How does this work at the molecular level and that there is irreversible damage.

O, conducted by investigators from FCUP – Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto and the Supercomputers Center in Barcelona, ​​and published in Genome Medicineanalyzed the detail 46 different tissues from the human body, from samples donated by more than 700 individuals (from smokers, non-smokers and former funers).

The analysis shows that tobacco smoke has the potential to change molecularly lungs, How it was known, but also pancreas, thyroid, esophagus or some regions of the brain – who have been studying so far.

The conclusions reveal that the smoke of tobacco causes irreversible changes, especially molecular changes that resemble the aging.

For the first time, it is demonstrated in a study such as tobacco smoke imitates and accelerates the effects of aging in the human body by combining tissue analysis with different techniques of genic expression, splicing, DNA methylation and histological changes.

“We have done a multi-tissue molecular analysis that provides a comprehensive view of the systemic and specific impact by tobacco consumption and how it can accelerate aging in our body”, Explains the teacher Pedro Gabriel Ferreirain a statement sent to zap.

The tobacco triggers the systemic inflammation tissue and causes epigenetic changes, namely the hypermethylation – A phenomenon of excess chemical changes in DNA associated with cancer development by silencing genes that control cell growth and division.

Aging is visible because Smokers develop epigenetic profiles similar to those of older people; These changes are strongly aligned with known aging mechanisms.

The effects which are simultaneously associated with smoking and aging.

Among the samples of former fumers, the changes associated with tobacco as reversible or non-reversible were classified, and was analyzed if the effects of tobacco that overlap with aging are more persistent.

“We identified molecular changes induced by tobacco that are not reversible after cessation. These are especially those that overlap aging signatures, ”says Rogério Ribeiro.

The study indicates that non -reversible changes have the same molecular responsible – The same genes or places in DNA – as aging.