Stanford Medicine researchers have developed a blood test that measures the biological aging of organs, indicating that younger brains are associated with increased longevity and reduced disease risk. This study, led by Tony Wyss-Coray, PhD, professor of neurology and neurological sciences at Stanford University, highlights the role of biological age in predicting health outcomes.
“We’ve developed a blood-based indicator of the age of your organs,” said Wyss-Coray. “With this indicator, we can assess the age of an organ today and predict the odds of your getting a disease associated with that organ 10 years later.”
The research analyzed data from 44,498 participants aged 40 to 70 from the UK Biobank project. The study used advanced laboratory technology to analyze nearly 3,000 proteins in each participant’s blood. An algorithm was then developed to assign a biological age to each organ based on protein levels.
Wyss-Coray emphasized the significance of brain health: “The brain is the gatekeeper of longevity. If you’ve got an old brain, you have an increased likelihood of mortality. If you’ve got a young brain, you’re probably going to live longer.”
According to Wyss-Coray’s team, having an extremely aged brain increases one’s risk for Alzheimer’s disease by over three times compared to those with normally aging brains. Conversely, having an extremely youthful brain significantly reduces this risk.
“This approach could lead to human experiments testing new longevity interventions for their effects on the biological ages of individual organs in individual people,” Wyss-Coray said.
While currently available only for research purposes, there are plans for commercialization through Teal Omics and Vero Bioscience. The study received funding from various organizations including the National Institutes of Health and Stanford Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center.
