The Role of the National Institute on Aging in the Development of the Field of Geroscience

Abstract

The conceptualization of the field of geroscience, which began about 10 years ago, marks, together with the publication of "The hallmarks of aging" (see López-Otín C, Blasco MA, Partridge L, Serrano M, Kroemer G. Cell 153: 1194-1217, 2013), a significant watershed in the development of aging research. Based on a very simple and commonly accepted premise, namely, that aging biology is at the core the most significant risk factor for all chronic diseases affecting the elderly, geroscience became possible because of earlier significant developments in the field of aging biology. Here we describe the origins of the concept, as well as its current status in the field. The principles of geroscience provide an important new biomedical perspective and have spawned a significantly increased interest in aging biology within the larger biomedical scientific community.

Figure 1.

Increase in funding on “aging” in several National Institutes of Health (NIH) institutes, between 2012 (blue) and 2016 (red), corresponding to the first 5 years of functioning of the trans-NIH GeroScience Interest Group (GSIG). (NIA) National Institute on Aging. Chart created from data derived from The Research, Condition, and Disease Categorization Process in an NIH RePORT (report.nih.gov/funding/categorical-spending/rcdc).