Biomarkers of aging: from primitive organisms to humans.
Leading biologists and clinicians interested in aging convened to discuss biomarkers of aging. The goals were to come to a consensus, construct an agenda for future research, and make appropriate recommendations to policy makers and the public-at-large. While there was not total agreement on all issues, they addressed a number of questions, among them whether biomarkers can be identified and used to measure the physiological age of any individual within a population, given emerging information about aging and new technological advances. The hurdles to establishing informative biomarkers include the biological variation between individuals that makes generalizations difficult; the overlapping of aging and disease processes; uncertainty regarding benign versus pathogenic age-related changes; the point at which a process begins to do damage to the organism, and, if so, when does it occur; and when to distinguish critical damage from noncritical damage. Finally, and significantly, it is difficult to obtain funding for this research.
Butler
Robert N
RN
International Longevity Center-USA, 60 E. 86th St., New York, NY 10028, USA. robertb@ilcusa.org
Sprott
Richard
R
Warner
Huber
H
Bland
Jeffrey
J
Feuers
Richie
R
Forster
Michael
M
Fillit
Howard
H
Harman
S Mitchell
SM
Hewitt
Michael
M
Hyman
Mark
M
Johnson
Kathleen
K
Kligman
Evan
E
McClearn
Gerald
G
Nelson
James
J
Richardson
Arlan
A
Sonntag
William
W
Weindruch
Richard
R
Wolf
Norman
N
D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D000818:Animals; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000032:analysis*; D006801:Humans; D011050:Policy Making; D012106:Research
D015415:Biomarkers