Fig 3. Overproducing Dga1p increases TAG abundance and extends chronological lifespan.

(A) Thin-layer chromatography of neutral lipids from eight-day old stationary phase cultures bearing either the empty vector (EV) or one that expresses Dga1p. DAG, diacylglycerol; FA, free fatty acids; ori., origins for chromatography. The two EV lanes in panel A are biological duplicates; each of the two DGA1 lanes represents the two different constructs with DGA1 or ADH1 promoter driving the recombinant gene expression. (B) Survival curves. These are averages of four DGA1 overexpression isolates (two of each plasmid transformants), and two vector control duplicates. To accommodate the use of episomal plamids, yeast cells were grown in SC-uracil medium, which, compared with the use of synthetic complete medium seen in Figs 1 and 2, likely caused slightly faster viability loss of all strains analyzed.