Senescent cells are deficient in

Telomeres serve to camouflage chromosome ends from the DNA damage response machinery. Telomerase activity is required to maintain telomeres. One consequence of telomere dysfunction is cellular senescence, a permanent growth arrest state. We review the key regulators of cellular senescence and recent in vivo evidence which suppos p53-dependent senescence induced by sho telomeres as a potent tumor suppressor pathway. The in vivo link between cellular senescence and tumor regression is also discussed. The relationship between sho telomere length and aging or disease states in various cells of the body is increasingly repoed Ref-Sathyanarayana 4/e