Alexey Matveevich Olovnikov

Alexey Matveevich Olovnikov was born in October 10, 1936, in Vladivostok, Russia. He was graduated from Moscow State University (MSU). He received his Ph.D. degree in immunochemistry from Gamaleya Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR, Moscow,1966. He is a Biologist and a Senior Researcher in the Institute of Biochemical physics of Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia. His fields of interests are theoretical biology, gerontology, immunology, carcinogenesis, evolution, anthropology. In 1971, he predicted the effect of DNA end underreplication (called as marginotomy) and deduced from it the inevitability of shortening of telomeres in dividing cells and the necessity of existence of telomerase (as a DNA polymerase that compensates the telomere shortening due to marginotomy). He also predicted correlation of the performed number of cell dividings with the shortening of telomeres and explained the circular form of genome of many prokaryotes, bacteria including, as a protection from the effect of DNA end underreplication. Olovnikov put forward the ion-fountain theory of genome regulation, in 2001; formulated, in 2003, the chronomere theory of aging; suggested the chronomere deletion as a primary cause of Alzheimer’s disease, in 2007; and postulated, in 2005, the existence of novel physiological system, namely, the so-called lunasensor system involved in regulation of long-termed biological rhythms.

Biography Updated on 3 May 2007