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Principal Investigators: Shelley L. Cargill, James R. Carey, Hans-Georg Muller, and Gary Anderson

These investigators tested the hypothesis that the input of young ovaries will decrease actuarial aging in the CBA-strain of mice by transplanting ovaries from young donor females into 5-, 8-, and 11-month-old females that had been pre-pubertally ovariectomized. The main finding was a nearly 40% increase in remaining life expectancy in the 11-month transplant cohort relative to the intact control cohort. Only 20% of the 11-month transplantation cohort died in the 300-day period following ovarian transplantation, whereas nearly 60% of the intact control cohort died in this same period. These results suggest that mice and other mammals can regulate their own aging rate via gonadal signaling.