Recent UH graduate develops 3D printable prostheses to restore amputees’ finger mobility

‘Lunet’ honored with prestigious design awards, created for worldwide use

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

 

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LUNET IS MADE UP OF COMMON 3D-PRINTED PLASTICS POLYLACTIC ACID AND THERMOPLASTIC POLYURETHANE. EACH FINGER CONTAINS FOUR PARTS HELD TOGETHER BY PLASTIC PINS.

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CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

A groundbreaking, easy-to-use 3D printable finger prosthesis created by a recent University of Houston graduate could offer amputees a low-cost solution to restore finger functionality. David Edquilang first designed Lunet, which doesn’t need metal fasteners, adhesives or special tools to assemble, as an undergraduate student at the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture and Design. While standard prostheses can cost thousands of dollars, Edquilang aims to make his design open access on the internet, instead of selling it.

“Not every good idea needs to be turned into a business. Sometimes, the best ideas just need to be put out there ,” said Edquilang, who graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Design last year. “Medical insurance will often not cover the cost of a finger prosthesis, since it is not considered vital enough compared to an arm or leg. Making Lunet available online for free will allow it to help the greatest number of people."

Edquilang’s mentor at UH was Associate Professor Jeff Feng, co-director of UH’s Industrial Design program. Through a partnership with Harris Health System, Feng learned of a patient who had her fingers amputated due to frostbite. Inspired by working on an upper limb prosthesis Edquilang previously developed with student Niell Gorman, working closely with Professor Feng, Edquilang created prosthetic fingers that returned mobility to the patient, allowing her to pick up objects again.

“It feels great knowing you have the capability to positively impact people’s lives and give them help they otherwise wouldn’t be able to get,” said Edquilang.

Months later, Edquilang was laser focused to make an even better product. Over the course of two weeks, under Feng’s advisory, he designed and tested 60 prototypes before reaching a final design that was more durable, easier to configure and assemble, and had improved functionality.

His “breakthrough” came from a literal break in his design. He intentionally broke one of his prototypes to see where its structural weak point was. It buckled at the distal knuckle, the joint that connects the bones at the fingertips, so he added a linkage that replaced the previously rigid distal knuckle, and an award-winning version of Lunet was born.

Lunet Wins Luminary Award

The prosthetic design garnered Edquilang a 2023 Red Dot: Luminary award, the highest level of recognition accorded at the Red Dot Award: Design Concept. He and Feng took home the coveted accolade at Red Dot's ceremony last month in Singapore. The winning design was chosen from a list of Best of the Best winners in various categories by Red Dot. Last year, Hyundai Motor Company won the Luminary award.

“Good results come from dedication. Extraordinary results come from experimentation. Incredible results come from a combination of both,” he said upon winning the award.

Lunet also won a 2023 Red Dot: Best of the Best award; two 2023 DNA Paris Design Awards in the Medical and Scientifics category and the Design for People category; won Gold for the 2023 Spark Design Award; was named a 2023 IDEA finalist; is currently a U.S. National Runner Up for the 2023 James Dyson Award and is continuing to compete in the international round of the Dyson award competition.

“David’s recent success in winning the most prestigious design awards across the world is the best manifestation of the unparalleled education and training students experience in our Industrial Design program,” Feng said. “Built upon a belief that every student is a creative individual, the program pedagogy focuses on methods of cultivating innovative minds, which is enforced with rigorous professional training.”

Lunet’s Geometry Inspired its Name

Lunet is made up of two common types of 3D printed plastics: polylactic acid and thermoplastic polyurethane. Each finger is made up of four parts held together by plastic pins. Edquilang describes arcs and circular orbits as the foundation for the motion of the finger mechanism. The geometric basis of the design evoked the idea that the prosthesis orbits around the user’s joints like a moon, or lunet, hence the name.

Another element of Lunet’s uniqueness is that it is nearly impossible to break; other finger prosthetics can be complicated and require many parts.

“The problem with higher mechanical complexity is that these designs are less durable,” Edquilang said. “The more parts you have, the more points of failure. You need to make prosthetic fingers robust and as strong as possible, so it doesn’t break under normal use, yet you want the design to be simple. This was one of the greatest challenges in making Lunet.”

He encourages other design students not to be afraid to experiment and fail because that is often how one can learn to improve the most.

“Where the world has an abundance of problems, designers have an abundance of talent, and we should not be selfish with it,” Edquilang said.

Harris Health patient using prototype of Lunet.

CREDIT

University of Houston

Jeff Feng, left, and David Edquilang, right, accepting the Luminary award in Singapore on Sept. 27, 2023.

CREDIT

Red Dot

 

American Society of Plant Biologists announces new peer review report policy

Business Announcement

AMERICAN SOCIETY OF PLANT BIOLOGISTS

 

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PLANT PHYSIOLOGY AND THE PLANT CELL ARE LEADING PLANT SCIENCE JOURNALS, BOTH PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN SCOIETY OF PLANT BIOLOGISTS.

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CREDIT: ASPB

Plant Physiology and The Plant Cell, published by the American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB), are introducing a new mechanism for publishing peer review reports on each journal’s website.

A version of peer review reports has been published with the supplemental material of original research articles in The Plant Cell for some time. However, for the first time the ASPB Editorial Office is introducing a uniform process for formatting and publishing these reports with Plant Physiology original research articles, as well.

The new peer review reports will closely replicate all comments from editors and reviewers to the authors during the peer review process for each draft of the manuscript, as well as the authors’ responses. Barring any other exceptional circumstances, the reports will only redact the following information that may appear in the decision letters: 1) The names of specific Associate or Monitoring Editors; 2) unpublished data submitted confidentially in response to reviewer comments (e.g., figures, tables; data not intended for the manuscript under review but only to support responses to reviewer comments) at the author’s request.

Peer review reports will continue to be published as part of supplemental material on an interim basis until completion of a new feature where they are posted via a link on the main page of approved articles on the journal websites.

The following is a synopsis of how this policy will affect key individual participants in the journals’ peer review process:

Authors
In keeping with a longstanding policy of The Plant Cell, authors will have the option to either opt in or out of publishing their peer review reports on the journal website. There will be a question during the submission process of the first draft of your manuscript that states the following:

I agree that if my manuscript is accepted for publication, and contingent upon my review and approval, a report of all peer review comments from reviewers and editors, as well as author responses, pertaining to each draft of the manuscript from submission to acceptance, will be posted publicly on the (journal name) website.

Yes

No

If an author selects no, the comments and responses the author received during peer review will stay confidential in the journal’s manuscript submission site, eJournalPress.

 

Reviewers
Reviewers should be aware upon accepting an invitation to review an original research article for either Plant Physiology or The Plant Cell that their comments, while remaining anonymous, may be publicly released, as received by the authors, as part of the article’s peer review report. Reviewers may not opt out of this policy if they accept an assignment to review a manuscript, and should continue to adhere to standard peer review practices while still subjecting manuscripts to rigorous analysis and critique.

 

Editors
Journal editors handling manuscripts during peer review should likewise be mindful that comments received by authors during peer review may transparently be made available later as part of a published peer review report, while still applying their usual scientific criteria in critiquing and issuing decisions on manuscripts. Exceptions for publishing comments as received by the authors are outlined above, but to reiterate, Plant Physiology and The Plant Cell will both redact the names of individual editors as part of the peer review report.

In posting peer review reports we hope to adhere to increasingly prevalent guidelines and practices for transparency in scientific publishing, and provide journal readers with full context for and understanding of our process of reviewing, editing, and publishing research.

Please contact the journals’ editorial office at publications@aspb.org if you have any questions about this policy.

###

ASPB is a professional scientific society, headquartered in Rockville, MD, that is devoted to the advancement of the plant sciences worldwide. With a membership of some 3,000 plant scientists from throughout the United States and around the world, the Society publishes two of the most widely cited plant science journals, The Plant Cell and Plant Physiology, and co-publishes the Open Access journal Plant Direct. ASPB also hosts the annual Plant Biology conference; supports plant science outreach, engagement, and advocacy; and powers the Plantae digital ecosystem for plant scientists. For more information about ASPB, please visit https://aspb.org/. Also follow ASPB on Facebook at facebook.com/myASPB, on Twitter @ASPB, and on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/98656.

WORD OF THE DAY

Programmed cell death may be 1.8 billion years old

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SMBE JOURNALS (MOLECULAR BIOLOGY AND EVOLUTION AND GENOME BIOLOGY AND EVOLUTION)

Apoptosis, often referred to as programmed cell death, is a fundamental process crucial to the growth and development of multicellular organisms. This process, or a primordial form of it, is also observed in single-celled eukaryotes like yeast and other microeukaryotes (aka protists). The origin of eukaryotic apoptosis remains an open question in biology. However, studies have noted that many apoptosis-initiating factors have a bacterial or mitochondrial origin, providing a clue into the evolutionary history of this widespread phenomenon. In a new study published in Genome Biology and Evolution, scientists from the Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics of the Polish Academy of Sciences reveal that many apoptotic factors may trace their origins to the time of mitochondrial domestication, suggesting remarkable conservation over the span of 1.8 billion years.

The processes triggering apoptosis exhibit striking similarities among various diverse eukaryotes: an increase in mitochondrial membrane permeability sets in motion a cascade of events involving proteins called apoptosis-inducing factors (AIFs), kickstarting the pathway that culminates in cell death. According to phylogenetic analyses, these AIFs usually have a bacterial/mitochondrial origin. To shed further light on the evolution of apoptosis across eukaryotes, a team led by Szymon Kaczanowski and Urszula Zielenkiewicz investigated the functional conservation of apoptotic factors through a yeast complementation test. The researchers replaced each of four apoptotic genes in yeast with related proteins from diverse eukaryotes and prokaryotes. They then treated the new yeast strains with apoptosis-inducing agents to evaluate whether the introduced genes maintained the ability to induce apoptosis in yeast. 

Remarkably, the study found that distantly related proteins from plants, animals, slime molds, and bacteria were largely able to functionally substitute for the original yeast proteins. “This surprising finding suggests that ancient mechanisms of cell death have been evolutionarily conserved since the domestication of mitochondria,” says Kaczanowski and Zielenkiewicz, an event that occurred approximately 1.8 billion years ago. 

The study’s findings further support an endosymbiotic origin of apoptosis, a hypothesis that was first proposed by Guido Kroemer in 1997. Kroemer suggested that the bacterial precursors of mitochondria produced both toxins (apoptotic factors) and antitoxins (anti-apoptotic factors). In this scenario, the antitoxins acted as “addiction molecules”, ensuring the persistence of the symbiont. Driven by this evolutionary conflict between bacterial endosymbionts and hosts, the toxins eventually evolved into the apoptotic factors we recognize today.

Kaczanowski and Zielenkiewicz present an alternative scenario for the evolution of apoptosis. They propose that early protoeukaryotes were predators, relying on bacterial prey. These bacteria, in response to predation, produced toxins as a defense mechanism. Over time, these bacteria were domesticated to serve as mitochondria within eukaryotic cells, and their toxins evolved into apoptotic factors. The different families of AIFs present today and their sporadic distribution across distantly related eukaryotes suggest the existence of multiple redundant toxins in the protomitochondria and hint at a coevolutionary arms race between protomitochondria and their protoeukaryotic hosts.

Regardless of whether apoptosis originates from an endosymbiotic toxin/antitoxin system or from a predator/prey dynamic, the study’s findings suggest that the intricate balance between life and death within eukaryotic cells is deeply rooted in the origin of mitochondria, opening up new avenues for research into the coevolution of mitochondria and eukaryotes, as well as the ancient origins of cell death mechanisms. Furthermore, a similar approach could be used to look at other ancient cellular mechanisms beyond programmed cell death and to ask to what extent conflicts among partners/participants have driven the evolution of genome features. “Future studies may reveal the evolutionary history of other aging mechanisms and could make a significant contribution to aging studies,” note Kaczanowski and Zielenkiewicz, emphasizing the broader implications of their research.

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JOURNAL

Genome Biology and Evolution

DOI

10.1093/gbe/evad154 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Cells

ARTICLE TITLE

Apoptotic Factors Are Evolutionarily Conserved Since Mitochondrial Domestication

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

11-Oct-2023

Simulations of ‘backwards time travel’ can improve scientific experiments

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

Physicists have shown that simulating models of hypothetical time travel can solve experimental problems that appear impossible to solve using standard physics.

If gamblers, investors and quantum experimentalists could bend the arrow of time, their advantage would be significantly higher, leading to significantly better outcomes. 

Researchers at the University of Cambridge have shown that by manipulating entanglement – a feature of quantum theory that causes particles to be intrinsically linked – they can simulate what could happen if one could travel backwards in time. So that gamblers, investors and quantum experimentalists could, in some cases, retroactively change their past actions and improve their outcomes in the present.

Whether particles can travel backwards in time is a controversial topic among physicists, even though scientists have previously simulated models of how such spacetime loops could behave if they did exist. By connecting their new theory to quantum metrology, which uses quantum theory to make highly sensitive measurements, the Cambridge team has shown that entanglement can solve problems that otherwise seem impossible. The study appears in Physical Review Letters.

“Imagine that you want to send a gift to someone: you need to send it on day one to make sure it arrives on day three,” said lead author David Arvidsson-Shukur, from the Cambridge Hitachi Laboratory. “However, you only receive that person’s wish list on day two. So, in this chronology-respecting scenario, it’s impossible for you to know in advance what they will want as a gift and to make sure you send the right one.

“Now imagine you can change what you send on day one with the information from the wish list received on day two. Our simulation uses quantum entanglement manipulation to show how you could retroactively change your previous actions to ensure the final outcome is the one you want.”

The simulation is based on quantum entanglement, which consists of strong correlations that quantum particles can share and classical particles—those governed by everyday physics—cannot.

The particularity of quantum physics is that if two particles are close enough to each other to interact, they can stay connected even when separated. This is the basis of quantum computing – the harnessing of connected particles to perform computations too complex for classical computers.

“In our proposal, an experimentalist entangles two particles,” said co-author Nicole Yunger Halpern, researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Maryland. “The first particle is then sent to be used in an experiment. Upon gaining new information, the experimentalist manipulates the second particle to effectively alter the first particle’s past state, changing the outcome of the experiment.”

“The effect is remarkable, but it happens only one time out of four!” said Arvidsson-Shukur. “In other words, the simulation has a 75% chance of failure. But the good news is that you know if you have failed. If we stay with our gift analogy, one out of four times, the gift will be the desired one (for example a pair of trousers), another time it will be a pair of trousers but in the wrong size, or the wrong colour, or it will be a jacket.”

To give their model relevance to technologies, the theorists connected it to quantum metrology. In a common quantum metrology experiment, photons—small particles of light—are shone onto a sample of interest and then registered with a special type of camera. If this experiment is to be efficient, the photons must be prepared in a certain way before they reach the sample. The researchers have shown that even if they learn how to best prepare the photons only after the photons have reached the sample, they can use simulations of time travel to retroactively change the original photons.

To counteract the high chance of failure, the theorists propose to send a huge number of entangled photons, knowing that some will eventually carry the correct, updated information. Then they would use a filter to ensure that the right photons pass to the camera, while the filter rejects the rest of the ‘bad’ photons.

“Consider our earlier analogy about gifts,” said co-author Aidan McConnell, who carried out this research during his master’s degree at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, and is now a PhD student at ETH, Zürich. “Let’s say sending gifts is inexpensive and we can send numerous parcels on day one. On day two we know which gift we should have sent. By the time the parcels arrive on day three, one out of every four gifts will be correct, and we select these by telling the recipient which deliveries to throw away.”

“That we need to use a filter to make our experiment work is actually pretty reassuring,” said Arvidsson-Shukur. “The world would be very strange if our time-travel simulation worked every time. Relativity and all the theories that we are building our understanding of our universe on would be out of the window.

“We are not proposing a time travel machine, but rather a deep dive into the fundamentals of quantum mechanics. These simulations do not allow you to go back and alter your past, but they do allow you to create a better tomorrow by fixing yesterday’s problems today.”

This work was supported by the Sweden-America Foundation, the Lars Hierta Memorial Foundation, Girton College, and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

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JOURNAL

Physical Review Letters

DOI

10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.150202 

ARTICLE TITLE

Nonclassical advantage in metrology established via quantum simulations of hypothetical closed timelike curves

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

12-Oct-2023

 

Funding will help further development of bacteriophages to combat disease on a commercial scale

Pioneering work to develop effective and safe bacteriophages to combat disease has received an £800,000 boost.

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF LEICESTER

 

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PROFESSOR MARTHA CLOKIE (LEFT) AND DR ANISHA THANKI

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CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF LEICESTER

Pioneering work to develop effective and safe bacteriophages to combat disease has received an £800,000 boost.

The grant from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), is aimed at advancing the production of phages to combat disease in the veterinary field and bring them to market.

It has been awarded to Professor Martha Clokie, the Director of the Leicester Centre of Phage Research, and Dr Anisha Thanki who earlier this year successfully developed a bacteriophage ‘liquid’ product to prevent Salmonella in broiler chickens.

The latter will now be used as a case study to advance ways in which this novel medicine can successfully and safely be produced in larger scales to meet UK guidelines.

Bacteriophage are viruses that infect bacteria and kill them. They are naturally occurring in the environment around us and can be found where high numbers of bacteria lurk. They have been identified by the UK Government and World Health Organisation as having great potential to prevent and treat infections.

Researcher, Dr Anisha Thanki helped develop the product to prevent Salmonella and will continue with this next stage.

She said: “We know that the development of bacteriophages will help counter growing resistance to existing antimicrobials. If a product such as this was eventually commercialised, it could save the farming industry billions of pounds each year while preventing Salmonella from entering our food chain – something which infects around 91,000 people in the EU every year.

“However, at present we have an effective product but no known way to bring it into wider commercial use. The work we’re doing is so novel that protocols and regulations don’t yet exist to allow that to happen. We’re very excited that this funding will allow us to translate this work to establish how to use phages effectively at a much larger scale and within UK regulation guidelines.

“Once we do this, we aim to have a successful blueprint to enable other effective phage products to be brought to the commercial market.”

Work on the two-year project begins early next year and will take place in collaboration with Dr Robert Atterbury from the University of Nottingham’s School of Veterinary Medicine and Science.

Dr Thanki added: “Working with the school will allow us to develop further models to study phage production on a larger scale and test production protocols to ensure its efficacy and safety.”

Dr Robert Atterbury, Associate Professor in Microbiology at the University of Nottingham said: “Antimicrobial resistance is one of the key global public health challenges of the 21st century. Bacteriophages show great promise in the treatment of infections caused by multidrug resistant bacteria in animals and people. This exciting project, supported by the BBSRC, will allow us to address some of the key hurdles currently preventing their wider use in the agrifood sector and beyond.”    

Bacteriophage used within the Salmonella trial, published in scientific journal, Emerging Microbes and Infections, was developed in the University’s pioneering new Leicester Centre for Bacteriophage Research which is studying bacteriophage-based products to prevent and treat bacterial infections in humans, animals and agriculture. 

 DOI  10.1080/22221751.2023.2217947 

SEE

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=PHAGES

 https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=BIOPHAGES

 https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=PHAGE

 https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=BACTERIOPHAGE

Flagship individuals can boost conservation

 NEWS RELEASE 12-OCT-2023

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

 

IMAGE: 

LUA THE ANTILLEAN MANATEE

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CREDIT: L CANDISANI

“Flagship” individual animals like Cecil the lion or Freya the walrus can boost conservation, new research suggests.

Much-loved species like pandas and polar bears are widely used in conservation campaigns.

However, a new study argues that individual animals or plants can also be used as flagships, with enormous potential to raise awareness and mobilise public support.

The recent outcry over the felling of the “Sycamore Gap” tree in the UK demonstrates the power of individual plants or animals in public opinion.

“Flagship individuals typically share some common characteristics,” said lead author Ivan Jarić, from the University of Paris-Saclay in France and Czech Academy of Sciences.

“They mostly belong to charismatic species, and they often have some particular individual characteristics that make them appealing.

“They frequently interact with humans, and they typically have unique life stories, such as tragic fate.

“By forming connections with people and generating empathy, such individuals can encourage engagement and behavioural change, attract donations and even spark policy changes.”

The paper highlights examples including Lua the Antillean manatee – a species severely depleted by habitat loss and hunting in Brazil.

In 1994, Lua – an orphaned calf – was among the first manatees released in a new reintroduction programme.

“Lua quickly became the symbol of the programme, being used in local media and community activities to gain public attention,” said Iran Normande, from the Federal University of Alagoas in Brazil, one of the authors of the study.

“Because of her docile nature and willingness to approach humans and boats, Lua gave many people their first contact with a wild manatee.

“This helped to create a local sustainable tourism industry that currently supports up to 400 families.

“Lua – now ‘middle-aged’ at 31 – was the first released manatee to successfully breed in the wild, and has had six calves.”

However, this example also highlights the potential downside of flagship individuals, as some visitors have fed Lua potentially harmful things including beer and fried fish.

“If properly implemented, the promotion of flagship individuals can produce substantial benefits for conservation from local to global scales,” said Dr Sarah Crowley from the University of Exeter, another co-author of the study.

“This needs to be done with care – both to avoid harm to the individual, and to prevent the spread of false or distorted information.

“More research is now needed to identify how to promote flagship individuals in a way that generates wider support for conservation, attracts new audiences and limits any potential harm.”

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JOURNAL

Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment

DOI

10.1002/fee.2599 

ARTICLE TITLE

Flagship individuals in biodiversity conservation

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

12-Oct-2023

Size matters: How body size shapes dogs' aging patterns

Smaller dogs may live twice as long life as their larger counterparts. But does this size difference also impact how dogs age in terms of behavior and cognitive abilities?

Peer-Reviewed Publication

EÖTVÖS LORÁND UNIVERSITY

 

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SMALLER DOGS MAY LIVE TWICE AS LONG LIFE AS THEIR LARGER COUNTERPARTS. 

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CREDIT: PHOTO: ENIKO KUBINYI / DEPARTMENT OF ETHOLOGY AT EÖTVÖS LORÁND UNIVERSITY

Smaller dogs may live twice as long life as their larger counterparts. But does this size difference also impact how dogs age in terms of behavior and cognitive abilities? Based on the data of 15,000 dogs, researchers from ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, found that larger dogs experience an earlier onset of age-related decline (at around seven-eight years of age versus ten-eleven years in smaller dogs), but also a slower decline rate compared to smaller dogs. Additionally, the study also points out that, although larger dogs have somewhat shorter lifespans, they also maintain their cognitive health longer and experience a smaller degree of age-related decline than their smaller counterparts.

The average life expectancy of dogs varies more than two-fold between breeds, with giant dogs generally living to seven years and small dogs to fourteen. Purebreds also have a shorter life span than mixed breeds. However, little is known about how life expectancy is related to age-related behavioral and cognitive decline. In a study published in GeroScience, researchers from ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, explored the intriguing connection between a dog's size and its aging process.  

The researchers collected data from over 15,000 dogs and assessed the age trajectories of various behavioral characteristics and the prevalence of canine cognitive dysfunction. They investigated at what age the behavioral and cognitive changes start, how fast the changes progress, and also examined factors like the dog's body size, head shape, purebred status in relation to these age-related changes.

According to the results, behavioral and cognitive aging in dogs begin around ten and a half years of age, but the onset of aging, as well as the aging rate depend on the body size of the dogs. Dogs weighing over thirty kilogram (66 lbs) show an earlier onset of age-related decline by two-three years, but the rate of decline is slower compared to smaller dogs. “Larger dogs experience a physical breakdown at an earlier age, and the accumulating illnesses, and degradation in sensory functions leads to ‘old age behaviors’ long before their mental decline would begin.” - explained Borbála Turcsán, first author of the study.

On the other hand,

dogs weighing less than approximately seven kilogram (14 lbs) exhibited over four times higher prevalence of cognitive decline in old age than larger dogs, supporting the idea that although larger dogs have a shorter lifespan, they also experience a more limited degree of cognitive decline.

Unexpectedly, long-nosed (dolichocephalic) dogs, such as greyhounds, and purebreds have a higher risk of developing cognitive decline in old age compared to meso- and brachycephalic dogs and mixed-breeds. 

One of the most interesting findings of the study was that owners started to consider their dogs "old" around the age of six, regardless of the size of the dog or its purebred status. "Owners consider their dogs “old’ four to five years earlier than would be expected from behavioral data. This may be due to graying and barely noticeable changes," explained Enikő Kubinyi, Head of the Senior Family Dog Project.

The new research highlights that body size not only influences a dog's life expectancy, but also its healthspan.

However, the effect is not gradual, as only extreme size groups, the very small (toy) or very large (giant) dogs have markedly different aging trajectories. “For those who want a smaller sized dog but do not want to risk severe mental health problems in old age or want a larger sized dog but do not want to risk physical health problems at 7-8 years of age, we recommend a dog from the 10-30 kg size range.”  - explained Turcsán. “Based on our results, these dogs have a longer healthspan relative to their expected lifespan than their smaller and larger counterparts.”

Does size difference also impact how dogs age in terms of behavior and cognitive abilities?

CREDIT

Photo: Eniko Kubinyi / Department of Ethology at Eötvös Loránd University

JOURNAL

GeroScience

DOI

10.1007/s11357-023-00945-9 

ARTICLE TITLE

Differential behavioral aging trajectories according to body size, expected lifespan, and head shape in dogs