Laboratory of AI and Biomedical Science (LABS), University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre, Department of Psychiatry, Melbourne Medical School, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Nat Aging. 2024 Sep;4(9):1290-1307. doi: 10.1038/s43587-024-00662-8. Epub 2024 Jun 28.
Investigating the genetic underpinnings of human aging is essential for unraveling the etiology of and developing actionable therapies for chronic diseases. Here, we characterize the genetic architecture of the biological age gap (BAG; the difference between machine learning-predicted age and chronological age) across nine human organ systems in 377,028 participants of European ancestry from the UK Biobank. The BAGs were computed using cross-validated support vector machines, incorporating imaging, physical traits and physiological measures. We identify 393 genomic loci-BAG pairs (P < 5 × 10) linked to the brain, eye, cardiovascular, hepatic, immune, metabolic, musculoskeletal, pulmonary and renal systems. Genetic variants associated with the nine BAGs are predominantly specific to the respective organ system (organ specificity) while exerting pleiotropic links with other organ systems (interorgan cross-talk). We find that genetic correlation between the nine BAGs mirrors their phenotypic correlation. Further, a multiorgan causal network established from two-sample Mendelian randomization and latent causal variance models revealed potential causality between chronic diseases (for example, Alzheimer's disease and diabetes), modifiable lifestyle factors (for example, sleep duration and body weight) and multiple BAGs. Our results illustrate the potential for improving human organ health via a multiorgan network, including lifestyle interventions and drug repurposing strategies.
研究人类衰老的遗传基础对于揭示慢性病的病因和开发可行的治疗方法至关重要。在这里,我们在 377028 名欧洲血统的 UK Biobank 参与者中,描述了跨九个人体器官系统的生物学年龄差距(BAG;机器学习预测年龄与实际年龄之间的差异)的遗传结构。BAG 是使用交叉验证支持向量机计算的,其中包含成像、身体特征和生理指标。我们确定了 393 个与大脑、眼睛、心血管、肝脏、免疫、代谢、肌肉骨骼、肺部和肾脏系统相关的基因组座-BAG 对(P<5×10)。与九个 BAG 相关的遗传变异主要是特定于相应器官系统的(器官特异性),同时与其他器官系统具有多效性联系(器官间交叉对话)。我们发现,九个 BAG 之间的遗传相关性反映了它们的表型相关性。此外,从两样本孟德尔随机化和潜在因果方差模型建立的多器官因果网络揭示了慢性疾病(例如阿尔茨海默病和糖尿病)、可改变的生活方式因素(例如睡眠时间和体重)与多个 BAG 之间的潜在因果关系。我们的研究结果表明,通过多器官网络(包括生活方式干预和药物再利用策略)改善人类器官健康具有潜力。