The road ahead for health and lifespan interventions
Marta Gonzalez-Freire Ageing Research Reviews Volume 59, May 2020, 101037
Highlights
• Translation of the advances made from model organisms to human clinical trials still remains a challenge, due to the high heterogeneity in the responses to the different anti-aging interventions (drugs, exercise, diet). How these interventions increase lifespan and improve healthspan in humans by targeting the hallmarks of aging is still unknown.
• Successful assessment in the efficacy of an intervention that delays aging will require validation through stringent outcome measures of phenotypic enhancement of longevity in various biological systems.
• Using ClinicalTrials.gov, a database of privately and publicly funded clinical studies conducted around the world, we found that exercise, fasting and CR are the interventions with the highest number of clinical trials that target aging as a condition followed by the compounds resveratrol metformin and NAD precursors.
Aging is a modifiable risk factor for most chronic diseases and an inevitable process in humans. The development of pharmacological interventions aimed at delaying or preventing the onset of chronic conditions and other age-related diseases has been at the forefront of the aging field. Preclinical findings have demonstrated that species, sex and strain confer significant heterogeneity on reaching the desired health- and lifespan-promoting pharmacological responses in model organisms. Translating the safety and efficacy of these interventions to humans and the lack of reliable biomarkers that serve as predictors of health outcomes remain a challenge. Here, we will survey current pharmacological interventions that promote lifespan extension and/or increased healthspan in animals and humans, and review the various anti-aging interventions selected for inclusion in the NIA’s Interventions Testing Program as well as the ClinicalTrials.gov database that target aging or age-related diseases in humans.