Scientists create brain scanning tools to predict aging rate

Researchers who developed a powerful new assessment tool say a single MRI brain scan can now reveal how fast a person is aging and predict their risk of dementia, chronic illness, and even death for several years before symptoms appear.

The technology, called Dunedinpacni, analyzes brain structures to estimate bioaging rates that are often very different from age.

Scientists at Duke, Harvard and Otago University use data from more than 50,000 brain scans around the world show that people who age through this measure have significantly higher risks of cognitive decline, physical fragility and mortality. These findings, published in natural aging, can help identify those who may benefit the most from early interventions, thereby slowing down age-related declines.

Beyond the Calendar Age: Measuring Real Bio Aging

“As we age, our age is completely different from the number of times we travel around the sun,” explains Ahmad Hariri, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University. Comparing people of different ages at a point in time, the tool measures changes in the same person over decades.

The breakthrough comes from the unique Dunedin study, which follows 1,037 people born the same year since birth. Researchers tracked 19 biomarkers, including blood pressure, lung function, cholesterol and even chewing gum recession – creating a gold standard measure of aging speed for nearly 20 years.

The main findings of the comprehensive analysis include:

• People with faster brain aging scores are 60% more likely to develop dementia
• The fastest elderly face 40% risk of mortality in a few years
• Brain-based predictions work just as well in different racial and socioeconomic groups
• The tool shows excellent reliability when multiple tests of the same person

Using MRI scans collected when the DUNEDIN participants were used, the researchers trained an algorithm to identify brain patterns associated with rapid aging. The tool analyzed 315 structural brain features, including cortical thickness, gray matter volume, and brain region size.

Predict health in the coming decades

When researchers applied their aging tools to brain scans in other studies, the results were surprising. In an analysis of 624 cognitively normal adults, memory problems and dementia were significantly earlier than slower elderly people at baseline than during the 16-year period of follow-up.

“What’s really cool is that we’ve captured the rate at which people age using data collected in middle age,” Hariri notes. “This helps us predict the diagnosis of dementia in older people.”

Brain teachers’ predictions far outweigh cognitive decline. People with faster aging ratings show an increase in weakness, reported poor overall health, and are at a higher risk of heart attacks, lung disease, and stroke. Compared with the average elderly, the fastest elderly are 18% more likely to develop chronic disease within a few years.

Importantly, the tool captures social determinants of health, and observes faster aging scores among people with lower education levels and income, reflecting a good pattern of health inequality.

Global verification across different populations

When the researchers applied their tools to brain scans in participants in Latin America, a critical test was conducted—a population that was insufficient in most brain aging studies. The results showed strong performance: People with Alzheimer’s disease and frontotemporal dementia showed accelerated aging patterns with the aging patterns seen in the North American dataset.

This cross-cultural validation suggests that aging brain signatures may be common, beyond geographical and demographic boundaries. The tool is performed similarly, whether it is analyzing scans of high-income participants in the UK or a variety of populations in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru.

The study meets urgent global health needs. With the number of people living longer worldwide, the number of adults over 65 is expected to double by 2050, accounting for a quarter of the global population. The cost of care for Alzheimer’s disease alone can grow from $1.33 trillion in 2020 to $9 trillion in 2050.

New window for prevention

Current Alzheimer’s treatments have largely failed because they begin after extensive brain injury occurs. Hariri observed: “The drug cannot revive the dying brain.” When interventions can still prevent irreversible declines, new tools can identify individuals at risk from years or decades ago.

The algorithm is available for free for researchers around the world and may accelerate research on causes of aging and anti-aging interventions. Now scientists can measure the aging effect in existing brain imaging studies without the need to collect additional data, i.e. insights that thousands of scans have been performed from the research database.

Although more research is required before clinical application, the tool represents a significant advance in understanding brain-body connections. As Hariri concluded: “We really think this is a key new tool for predicting and predicting disease risks, especially Alzheimer’s and related dementia.”

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