Researchers have in the past identified the activities of CaMKII as potential issue in degenerative aging, particularly in muscle tissue. Species differences in its activities are in fact a good example of antagonistic pleiotropy, in that mammalian CaMKII exhibits specific structural differences versus the analogous proteins in lower species that act to produce both better muscle function in youth and worse harms to muscle function in later life. Unfortunately CaMKII has many functions in many different tissues, so it isn't a straightforward target for therapies. Here, researchers use a tissue-specific inhibition in aged muscle to demonstrate that reduced CaMKII expression can reverse some of the characteristic age-related changes in muscle cell biochemistry and improve aspects of muscle function in old mice.
Sarcopenia, the age-related loss of muscle strength and mass, contributes to adverse health outcomes in older adults. While exercise mitigates sarcopenia by transiently activating calcium (Ca2+)-dependent and reactive oxygen species (ROS)-dependent signaling pathways that enhance muscle performance and adaptation, these same signals become chronically elevated in aged skeletal muscle and promote functional decline.
Researchers have in the past identified the activities of Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II (CaMKII) is a key transducer of both Ca2+ and ROS signals during exercise. Here we show that CaMKII is chronically activated in aged muscles, promoting muscle dysfunction. Muscle-specific expression of a constitutively active CaMKII construct in young mice recapitulates features of aging muscles, including impaired contractility, progressive atrophy, mitochondrial disorganization, formation of tubular aggregates, and an older transcriptional profile characterized by the activation of inflammatory and stress response pathways. Mediation analysis identified altered heme metabolism as a potential mechanism of CaMKII-induced weakness, independent of muscle atrophy. Conversely, partial inhibition of CaMKII in aged muscle improved contractile function and shifted the transcriptome toward a more youthful state without inducing hypertrophy.
These findings identify chronic CaMKII activation as a driver of functional and molecular muscle aging and support the concept that CaMKII exemplifies antagonistic pleiotropy, whereby its beneficial roles in promoting muscle performance and adaptation during youth may incur deleterious consequences in aging. We propose that persistent CaMKII activation in aged skeletal muscle reflects unresolved cellular stress and promotes maladaptive remodeling. Enhancing physiological reserve capacity through exercise, in combination with temporally targeted CaMKII inhibition, may help restore adaptive CaMKII signaling dynamics and preserve muscle function in aging.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.07.30.667744
View the full article at FightAging
