Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2017 Feb;72(2):210-215.
doi: 10.1093/gerona/glw191. Epub 2016 Oct 7.

The Longitudinal Study of Aging in Human Young Adults: Knowledge Gaps and Research Agenda

Terrie E Moffitt  1   2   3 , Daniel W Belsky  4   5 , Andrea Danese  3 , Richie Poulton  6 , Avshalom Caspi  7   2   3
Affiliations

The Longitudinal Study of Aging in Human Young Adults: Knowledge Gaps and Research Agenda

Terrie E Moffitt et al. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2017 Feb.

Abstract

Background: To prevent onset of age-related diseases and physical and cognitive decline, interventions to slow human aging and extend health span must eventually be applied to people while they are still young and healthy. Yet most human aging research examines older adults, many with chronic disease, and little is known about aging in healthy young humans.

Method: This article explains how this knowledge gap is a barrier to extending health span and puts forward the case that geroscience should invest in researching the pace of aging in young adults. As one illustrative example, we describe an initial effort to study the pace of aging in a young-adult birth cohort by using repeated waves of biomarkers collected across the third and fourth decades to quantify the pace of coordinated physiological deterioration across multiple organ systems (eg, pulmonary, periodontal, cardiovascular, renal, hepatic, metabolic, and immune function).

Results: Findings provided proof of principle that it is possible to quantify individual variation in the pace of aging in young adults still free of age-related diseases.

Conclusions: This article articulates research needs to improve longitudinal measurement of the pace of aging in young people, to pinpoint factors that slow or speed the pace of aging, to compare pace of aging against genomic clocks, to explain slow-aging young adults, and to apply pace of aging in preventive clinical trials of antiaging therapies. This article puts forward a research agenda to fill the knowledge gap concerning lifelong causes of aging.

Keywords: Geroscience; Health span; Longitudinal cohort study; Young adults.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Studying aging as a lifelong process: A brief conceptual history.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Murray CJ, Atkinson C, Bhalla K, et al. The state of US health, 1990–2010: burden of diseases, injuries, and risk factors. JAMA. 2013;310:591–608. doi:10.1001/jama.2013.13805 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Burch JB, Augustine AD, Frieden LA, et al. Advances in geroscience: impact on healthspan and chronic disease. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2014;69(suppl 1):S1–S3. doi:10.1093/gerona/glu041 - PMC - PubMed
    1. de Cabo R, Carmona-Gutierrez D, Bernier M, Hall MN, Madeo F. The search for antiaging interventions: from elixirs to fasting regimens. Cell. 2014;157:1515–1526. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2014.05.031 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Longo VD, Antebi A, Bartke A, et al. Interventions to slow aging in humans: Are we ready? Aging Cell. 2015;14:497–510. doi:10.1111/acel.12338 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Fontana L, Kennedy BK, Longo VD, Seals D, Melov S. Medical research: treat ageing. Nature. 2014;511:405–407. doi:10.1038/511405a - PubMed

Publication types