Assessing Epigenetic Aging in Post-Treatment Cancer Survivors

Aging is a risk factor for cancer, and evidence suggests that cancer and its treatments can accelerate aging. A central aim of geroscience is to develop interventions that slow, reverse, or stop the detrimental molecular and cellular changes that occur with aging to improve health and reduce disease burden, including cancer and cancer-related outcomes. Over the last decade, researchers have made significant progress on multiple iterations of biomarkers and diverse aging clocks that can assess one’s rate of aging relative to the general population. Aging clocks have been trained and tested on a wide range of epigenome, proteome, microbiome, and imaging data. Recently, these clocks have been used to predict cancer risk and treatment-related outcomes in cancer survivors.

On June 20th, the webinar centered on biomarkers of aging and their use in cancer survivorship studies. Speakers discussed how biomarkers of aging or aging clocks are being used in cancer research and where they see knowledge gaps, challenges, and future opportunities for research and clinical use.

This webinar is a collaboration between the Perspectives on Cancer and Aging: The Arti Hurria Memorial Webinar Series and the NIA Aging Clocks Series.