Tag: epigenetic clock

Categories : Ageing Diet and NutritionTags :

Healthy Eating Associated with Slower Biological Aging – But No One Diet is Best

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Photo by Gustavo Fring

A study by DZNE finds that healthy eating is associated with slower biological aging – and that there is more than one way to eat healthily. The researchers examined ten dietary patterns considered healthy, including the Mediterranean, Nordic, and a plant-based diet, as well as the DASH diet, which is designed to help lower blood pressure. All were linked with slower biological aging, with age-related changes in the DNA serving as markers. These results, based on data from DZNE’s Rhineland Study and confirmed with data from an independent study, are published in the journal Nature Communications. 

“Our study suggests that healthy eating goes hand in hand with slower biological aging. The effects are not massive, but they are measurable and relevant for prevention. By slowing the aging process, the risk of age-related diseases such as dementia or cardiovascular disorders can be reduced. Thus, healthy eating contributes to healthy aging,” says Prof. Monique Breteler, Director of Population Health Sciences at DZNE and head of the Rhineland Study. “Importantly, there is probably no single ‘correct’ diet. According to our data, various dietary patterns are associated with slower aging, some more, some less. That is an encouraging finding, because it leaves room to tailor healthy eating to personal and cultural preferences, budget and taste.” 

Molecular Aging Measures 

For their analysis, the researchers evaluated blood samples and dietary habits from about 7500 women and men: This included 6470 participants of DZNE’s Rhineland Study in Bonn – where the findings were initially made – and 1034 participants of the EPIC-Potsdam Study of the German Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbrücke (DIfE), where the key results were independently confirmed.  

From blood, the team determined chemical modifications in the DNA, known as “DNA methylation patterns”, which influence gene activity and thus biological mechanisms. Since these molecular markers change systematically over the course of life, they are considered indicators of biological aging. 

“We applied three different approaches, so-called epigenetic clocks, to read biological aging from DNA methylation,” explains Juliana Tavares, a doctoral researcher at DZNE and lead author of the current publication. “To this end, we leveraged state-of-the-art technology, which allowed us to cover about 850 000 sites in the DNA. This is roughly twice as many as in most previous studies.” 

Healthy Eating: Different for Everyone 

The researchers also matched every participant’s eating habits against the recommendations of each of the ten diets studied. Adherence was quantified and graded using a scoring system based on how closely individuals followed each dietary pattern. “One and the same person could therefore rank high on one diet score and low on another. In other words: People who ate healthily by one standard were often not the same people who ate healthily by another. According to our data, hardly anyone counts as a healthy eater by every standard at once,” says Tavares. 

However, across the board, higher diet quality was associated with slower biological aging. This applied to all of the ten diets examined. “While there are measurably differences between the diets, they are modest in absolute terms. It’s the big picture what matters,” says Tavares. “In summary: When it comes to slowing down the aging process, there isn’t just one healthy diet, but indeed a whole repertoire of possible diets with a positive effect.”  

One result was particularly noteworthy: the association between diet quality and slower biological aging was most pronounced in smokers, even though smokers were by no means eating healthier than non-smokers. The biological explanation is still open. “Smoking is very harmful to health,” says Tavares, “One explanation for our findings might be that there is just more health benefit to gain for smokers by eating healthy because of the enormous detrimental effects of smoking.” 

Shared Biological Pathways 

Although each dietary pattern was associated with its own distinct set of DNA methylation sites, the biological mechanisms involved showed substantial overlap. “More than 70 percent of the affected biological pathways were shared across all diets. These involve cell structure, cell signalling and metabolism – processes central to aging and chronic disease. Therefore, it is understandable that the dietary patterns we examined were all linked with a slowing of biological aging,” says Tavares. “A few pathways were diet-specific, and they matched each diet’s main objectives: heart-related pathways were unique to the DASH diet, and pathways related to cognition and memory were unique to the so-called MIND diet, which aims to support brain health. You don’t need a perfect diet – that may be the most practical message here. But moving forward, the diet-specific pathways point to future research on targeted dietary interventions. This could be helpful in designing targeted health recommendations.” 

Source: DZNE

Categories : Mental Health NeurologyTags :

Certain Mental Disorders Are Associated with Faster Brain Ageing

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Increased brain ageing was associated with dementia, addiction and psychiatric disorders like schizophrenia

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People with dementia, mild cognitive impairment, alcohol addiction, or psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia show increased brain ageing, each in specific patterns within the brain, according to a study published July 21st in the open access journal PLOS Medicine by Shile Qi from the Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, China, and colleagues.

Some conditions can make the brain age faster. Scientists calculate how old the brain is relative to the body using the predictive age difference (PAD), the difference between chronological age and the age predicted by brain imaging, where a positive PAD indicates that ageing is accentuated or increased. To better understand how brain disorders and divergences might affect brain ageing, the authors of this study collected structure magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data from 45 900 controls across several brain imaging banks, and compared them with those of 2698 patients with different brain conditions and differences, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorder (ASD), alcohol or tobacco addiction, Alzheimer’s disease (AD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder.

The authors found that neurodegenerative disorders of AD and MCI had the largest association with a high PAD. Addiction and psychiatric disorders were also associated with increased PAD. In contrast, there were no differences in PAD between people with ADHD or ASD and controls.

The researchers also looked at PAD values in specific areas of the brain, and examined which genes showed increased expression in people with different brain conditions. The prefrontal cortex showed higher PAD across brain disorders. Higher PAD in the frontal and temporal lobes was associated with psychiatric disorders, while high PAD in the frontal and occipital cortex was associated with dementia. Addiction was connected with high PAD in the default mode network, and in the salience network and the putamen and thalamus. There were also differences in gene transcription that associated with specific conditions and divergences. While the results are correlational, and not causal, and while some conditions such as psychiatric disorders and addiction have high co-occurrence, the author suggest that understanding more about PAD could help provide biomarkers for commonly occurring brain disorders.

The authors add, “Different neurological disorders appear to leave different signatures on the brain ageing clock, which may help researchers better understand the neural and biological pathways involved in these conditions.”

Provided by PLOS

Categories : AgeingTags :

Omega-3s can Slow Down the Aging Process – Slightly

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Photo by Ravi Patel on Unsplash

Previous clinical studies have shown that a reduced calorie intake can slow down the aging process in humans. Taking vitamin D or omega-3 fatty acids has also shown promising results in slowing biological aging in animals. However, it was unclear whether these measures would also work in humans.

The therapies previously tested in the DO-HEALTH study led by Heike Bischoff-Ferrari are also associated with a slowing of the aging process. These showed that vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids, as well as regular physical activity, reduce the risk of infections and falls, and prevent cancer and premature frailty. “These results inspired us to measure the direct influence of these three therapies on the biological aging process in the Swiss DO-HEALTH participants,” says Bischoff-Ferrari, professor of geriatrics and geriatric medicine at the University of Zurich.

Measuring biological and chronological age

One scientific approach to making biological aging measurable is the use of epigenetic clocks. They record chemical modifications of the DNA molecule, known as methylation, and thus quantify the difference between biological and chronological aging. The DO-HEALTH study has now for the first time investigated how sensitively this molecular biological measurement method reacts to targeted treatment.

The team led by Heike Bischoff-Ferrari, in collaboration with Steve Horvath, senior researcher at Altos Labs Cambridge (UK), who developed the watches, investigated the effect of omega-3s and/or vitamin D and/or simple strength training on biological aging in 777 people over the age of 70. Eight different treatment combinations were tested during the three-year study: subjects took 2000 international units (IU) of vitamin D and/or 1 gram of omega-3 fatty acids (from algae) daily and/or performed 30 minutes of strength training at home three times a week.

Biological age slowed down

When the researchers analysed the blood samples, they found that taking omega-3 fatty acids slowed down biological aging across several epigenetic clocks by up to four months – regardless of subjects’ gender, age or body mass index. The combination of omega-3, vitamin D and strength training proved to be even more effective, according to one of the four epigenetic clocks used.

“This result extends our previous findings from the DO-HEALTH study, in which these three factors combined had the greatest impact on reducing the risk of cancer and preventing premature frailty over a three-year period, to slowing down the biological aging process,” says Bischoff-Ferrari. Each of these measures works through different mechanisms that complement each other and, when combined, result in a heightened overall effect, according to the study author.

DO-HEALTH as a validation platform

At the same time, the research team draws attention to the limitations of the study. “There is no generally accepted gold standard for measuring biological age,” Bischoff-Ferrari explains. “However, we analysed the best currently validated epigenetic clocks, which reflect the state of the art.” To further advance the clinical application of biological clocks, Bischoff-Ferrari, together with leading international researchers in the Global Health Span Extension Consortium, plans to use DO-HEALTH and other global intervention studies as a validation platform for novel biomarkers of aging.

The researchers also point out that the sample consists exclusively of Swiss participants but will extend the trial to more countries.

Source: University of Zurich

Categories : Ageing Obstetrics & GynaecologyTags :

Pregnancy may Add Months to a Woman’s Biological Age

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Source: Pixabay CC0

Pregnancy may carry a cost, according to a new study involving 1735 young people in the Philippines, and shows that women who reported having been pregnant looked biologically older than women who had never been pregnant, and women who had been pregnant more often looked biologically older than those who reported fewer pregnancies.

Notably, the number of pregnancies fathered was not associated with biological aging among same-aged cohort men, which implies that it is something about pregnancy or breastfeeding specifically that accelerates biological aging. The findings are published in the Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences.
 
This study, from the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, builds on epidemiological findings that high fertility can have negative side effects on women’s health and longevity. What was unknown, however, was whether the costs of reproduction were present earlier in life, before disease and age-related decline start to become apparent. Until now, one of the challenges has been quantifying biological aging among the young. This challenge was overcome by using a collection of new tools that use DNA methylation (DNAm) to study different facets of cellular aging, health, and mortality risk. These tools, called ‘epigenetic clocks’ allow researchers to study aging earlier in life, filling a key gap in the study of biological aging.
 
“Epigenetic clocks have revolutionised how we study biological aging across the lifecourse and open up new opportunities to study how and when long-term health costs of reproduction and other life events take hold”, said Calen Ryan, PhD, associate research scientist in the Columbia Aging Center, and lead author.
 
“Our findings suggest that pregnancy speeds up biological aging, and that these effects are apparent in young, high-fertility women,” said Ryan. “Our results are also the first to follow the same women through time, linking changes in each woman’s pregnancy number to changes in her biological age.”
 
The relationship between pregnancy history and biological age persisted even after taking into account various other factors tied to biological aging, such as socioeconomic status, smoking, and genetic variation, but were not present among men from the same sample. This finding, noted Ryan, points to some aspect of bearing children – rather than sociocultural factors associated with early fertility or sexual activity – as a driver of biological aging.
 
Despite the striking nature of the findings, Ryan encourages readers to remember the context: “Many of the reported pregnancies in our baseline measure occurred during late adolescence, when women are still growing. We expect this kind of pregnancy to be particularly challenging for a growing mother, especially if her access to healthcare, resources, or other forms of support is limited.”
 
Ryan also acknowledged that there is more work to do, “We still have a lot to learn about the role of pregnancy and other aspects of reproduction in the aging process. We also do not know the extent to which accelerated epigenetic aging in these particular individuals will manifest as poor health or mortality decades later in life.”
 
Ryan said that our current understanding of epigenetic clocks and how they predict health and mortality comes largely from North America and Europe, but that the aging process can take slightly different forms in the Philippines and other places around the world.

“Ultimately I think our findings highlight the potential long-term impacts of pregnancy on women’s health, and the importance of taking care of new parents, especially young mothers.”

Source: Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health

Categories : AgeingTags :

More Schooling is Linked to Slowed Aging and Increased Longevity

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Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels

Participants in the Framingham Heart Study who achieved higher levels of education tended to age more slowly and went on to live longer lives as compared to those who did not achieve upward educational mobility, according to a new study at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and The Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center. Upward educational mobility was significantly associated with a slower pace of aging and lower risk of death. The results are published online in JAMA Network Open.

The Framingham Heart Study is an ongoing observational study first initiated in 1948 that currently spans three generations.

The Columbia analysis is the first to connect educational mobility with pace of biological aging and mortality. “We’ve known for a long time that people who have higher levels of education tend to live longer lives. But there are a bunch of challenges in figuring out how that happens and, critically, whether interventions to promote educational attainment will contribute to healthy longevity,” said Daniel Belsky, PhD, associate professor of Epidemiology at Columbia Mailman School and the Aging Center and senior author of the paper.

To measure pace of aging, the researchers applied an algorithm known as the DunedinPACE epigenetic clock to genomic data collected by the Framingham Heart Study. The latest findings showed that, according to the yardstick of the DunedinPACE epigenetic clock, two years of additional schooling translated to a two- to three percent slower pace of aging. This slowing in the pace of aging corresponds to a roughly 10 percent reduction in risk of mortality in the Framingham Heart Study, according to previous research by Belsky on the association of DunedinPACE with risk of death.

DunedinPACE was developed by the Columbia researchers and colleagues and reported in January 2022. Based on an analysis of chemical tags on the DNA contained in white blood cells, or DNA methylation marks, DunedinPACE is named after the Dunedin Study birth cohort used to develop it. DunedinPACE (stands for Pace of Aging Computed from the Epigenome), is measured from a blood test and functions like a speedometer for the aging process, measuring how fast or slow a person’s body is changing as they grow older.

Biological aging refers to the accumulation of molecular changes that progressively undermine the integrity and resilience capacity of our cells, tissues and organs as we grow older.

The Columbia researchers used data from 14 106 Framingham Heart Study spanning three generations to link children’s educational attainment data with that of their parents. They then used data from a subset of participants who provided blood samples during data collection to calculate the pace of biological aging using the DunedinPACE epigenetic clock. In primary analysis, the researchers tested associations between educational mobility, aging, and mortality in a subset of 3101 participants for whom educational mobility and pace of aging measures could be calculated.

For 2437 participants with a sibling, the researchers also tested whether differences in educational attainment between siblings was associated with a difference in the pace of aging.

“A key confound in studies like these is that people with different levels of education tend to come from families with different educational backgrounds and different levels of other resources,” explained Gloria Graf, a PhD candidate in the Department of Epidemiology supervised by Belsky, and first author of the study. “To address these confounds, we focused on educational mobility, how much more (or less) education a person completed relative to their parents, and sibling differences in educational attainment – how much more (or less) education a person completed relative to their siblings. These study designs control for differences between families and allow us to isolate the effects of education.”

By combining these study designs with the new DunedinPACE epigenetic clock, the researchers were able to test how education affects the pace of aging. Then, by linking the education and pace of aging data with longitudinal records of how long participants lived, the team was able to determine if a slower pace of aging accounted for increased longevity in people with more education.

“Our findings support the hypothesis that interventions to promote educational attainment will slow the pace of biological aging and promote longevity,” noted Graf. “Ultimately, experimental evidence is needed to confirm our findings,” added Belsky. “Epigenetic clocks like DunedinPace have potential to enhance such experimental studies by providing an outcome that can reflect impacts of education on healthy aging well before the onset of disease and disability in later life.”

“We found that upward educational mobility was associated both with a slower pace of aging and decreased risk of death,” said Graf. “In fact, up to half of the educational gradient in mortality we observed was explained by healthier aging trajectories among better-educated participants.” This pattern of association was similar across generations and held within family sibling comparisons: siblings with higher educational mobility tended to have a slower pace of aging as compared with their less educated siblings.

Source: Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health