David Sinclair

Background

David Sinclair is Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and co-director of the Paul F. Glenn Center for Biology of Aging Research. He trained in Australia and did postdoctoral work with Lenny Guarente at MIT on yeast sirtuin biology.

Lines of work

• Sirtuin biology: founding contributions to the sirtuin–ageing hypothesis; mechanisms by which sirtuins translate metabolic state into chromatin and metabolic regulation.
• NAD⁺ metabolism: characterisation of age-related NAD⁺ decline and the rationale for NAD precursor supplementation.
• Resveratrol and other sirtuin-activating compounds (an area with unresolved mechanistic debate).
• Information theory of aging: framing aging as a loss of epigenetic information that can in principle be restored.
• Partial epigenetic reprogramming: using subsets of the Yamanaka factors (OSK) to restore vision in mouse models of glaucoma.

Public profile

Sinclair is one of the most publicly visible longevity researchers, authoring the popular book Lifespan (2019) and co-hosting a podcast. Some of his public claims have been criticised by other researchers as running ahead of the published evidence; readers should weigh primary literature carefully.

Affiliations / disclosures

Co-founder of multiple biotech companies including Sirtris, Life Biosciences, and others. Disclosure statements appear with his peer-reviewed publications.

Related entries

See also: Epigenetic alterations, NAD+ precursors, Stem cell exhaustion.