Michael Rera

4th floor

25 Rue Hélène Brion

75013, Paris

Trying to understand what ageing is, where it comes from and where it gets us, since 2005. Building the two-phase ageing framework since I first described the Smurf phenotype in Drosophila melanogaster . I started my research group "Understanding The End-of-Life" (UTELife) in 2018.

The core of the research project I am carrying is strongly transdisciplinary, from basic biology, genetics and physiology to bioinformatics and mathematical modeling.

Research team

Savandara Besse, postdoc
Hayet Bouzid, 1st year PhD student co-supervised with Clément Carré (MCF, SU)
Marina Abakarova, 2nd year PhD student co-supervised with Elodie Laine (MCF, SU)

Alumni

Céline Cansell, PhD
Flaminia Zane, PhD (graduated may 2022)
Fanny Bain, Engineer

news

Nov 5, 2023	New article online at Genome Biology and Evolution, first article from Marina Abakarova’s PhD Alignment-based protein mutational landscape prediction: doing more with less
Oct 13, 2023	New article online @AgingCell Smurfness-based two-phase model of ageing helps deconvolve the ageing transcriptional signature the Smurf phenotype is naturally occuring increased intestinal permeability to small molecules. We identify Smurf individuals in vivo thanks to a non-toxic blue food dye that diffuses throughout the body a few days prior to flies death from natural causes (hence the name) pic.twitter.com/zYJO8tOFMA— Michael Rera (@Michael__Rera) October 12, 2023
Aug 16, 2023	New preprint on figshare, Two phases model of ageing in mice: towards a better identification of age-related and late-life metabolic decline [Registered Report Stage 1 Protocol]
Nov 24, 2022	New preprint on bioRxiv, Smurfness-based two-phase model of ageing helps deconvolve the ageing transcriptional signature
Sep 22, 2022	An article about the mission we conducted in Costa Rica Tropen Station in The Conversation.

selected publications

Two phases model of ageing in mice: towards a better identification of age-related and late-life metabolic decline [Registered Report Stage 1 Protocol]

Cansell, Céline, Goepp, Vivien, Bain, Fanny, Todd, Nicolas, Douard, Veronique, Monnoye, Magali, Sanchez, Clara, Pietrancosta, Nicolas, Rovere, Carole, Denis, Raphael GP, Luquet, Serge, and Rera, Michael

Aug 2023

Abs

Since being described in Drosophila melanogaster in 2011, the Smurf phenotype, has been seen to be evolutionarily conserved in nematode and zebrafish, and has helped to identify the discontinuous nature of ageing and predict impending death from natural causes as well as from environmental stresses. This phenotype allowed us to model ageing as being made of two successive phases : a phase A where individuals are healthy and have no risk of mortality but an age-dependent increasing risk of entering phase B, followed by a phase B where individuals show the so-called hallmarks of ageing and a high risk of death. We will test here whether these two consecutive phases of ageing separated by the Smurf transition are a conserved feature of ageing in the classical mammalian laboratory model Mus musculus. Thanks to a longitudinal longevity study using both males and females from two different mouse genetic backgrounds and by integrating physiological, metabolic and molecular measurements with the life history of approximately 150 mice, we are attempting to identify a phenotypic signature typical of the last phase of life, observable at any chronological age. Validating the two-phase ageing model in a mammalian organism would allow the high risk of imminent death to be better characterized in this model and would extend its implications to a broader range of species for aging research.
Positive selection of senescence through increased evolvability: ageing is not a by-product of evolution.

Roget, Tristan, Jolivet, Pierre, Méléard, Sylvie, and Rera, Michael

bioRxiv Aug 2022
Ethical and social implications of approaching death prediction in humans-when the biology of ageing meets existential issues

Gaille, Marie, Araneda, Marco, Dubost, Clément, Guillermain, Clémence, Kaakai, Sarah, Ricadat, Elise, Todd, Nicolas, and Rera, Michael

BMC Medical Ethics Aug 2020
Two phases of aging separated by the Smurf transition as a public path to death

Dambroise, Emilie, Monnier, Lea, Ruisheng, Lu, Aguilaniu, Hugo, Joly, J-S, Tricoire, Herve, and Rera, Michael

Scientific reports Aug 2016
A new, discontinuous 2 phases of aging model: Lessons from Drosophila melanogaster

Tricoire, Hervé, and Rera, Michael

PloS one Aug 2015
Intestinal barrier dysfunction links metabolic and inflammatory markers of aging to death in Drosophila

Rera, Michael, Clark, Rebecca I, and Walker, David W

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug 2012