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Epigenetic Age Acceleration Assessed With Human White-Matter Images, Karen Hodgson, Melanie A. Carless, Hemant Kulkarni, Joanne E. Curran, Emma Sprooten, Emma E. Knowles, Samuel R. Mathias, Harald H. H. Goring, Nailin Yao, Rene L. Olvera, Laura Almasy, Ravindranath Duggirala, John Blangero, David C. Glahn

School of Medicine Publications and Presentations

The accurate estimation of age using methylation data has proved a useful and heritable biomarker, with acceleration in epigenetic age predicting a number of age-related phenotypes. Measures of white matter integrity in the brain are also heritable and highly sensitive to both normal and pathological aging processes across adulthood. We consider the phenotypic and genetic interrelationships between epigenetic age acceleration and white matter integrity in humans. Our goal was to investigate processes that underlie interindividual variability in age-related changes in the brain. Using blood taken from a Mexican-American extended pedigree sample (n = 628; age = 23.28-93.11 years), epigenetic …