People under the age of 55 are more likely to experience accelerated aging, and that’s linked to more early-onset solid tumors, according to research presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting held earlier this month.
At the meeting, Ruiyi Tian, a graduate student at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, presented her team’s research.
“Multiple cancer types are becoming increasingly common among younger adults in the United States and globally,” Tian said. “Understanding the factors driving this increase will be key to improve the prevention or early detection of cancers in younger and future generations.”
The team thought that increased biological age, which can show accelerated aging, may contribute to the development of early-onset cancers. (Those are cancers diagnosed in adults under the age of 55.) Chronological age, which measures how long a person has been alive differs from biological age because biological age is about the condition of a person’s body and physiological processes and can be modified, Tian said.
The team focused on the link between biological age and cancer risk in 148,724 younger individuals whose data was in the UK Biobank. Researchers determined a person’s biological age from blood markers. Those with a higher biological age compared to chronological age were defined as having accelerated aging.
“Unlike chronological age, biological age may be influenced by factors such as diet, physical activity, mental health and environmental stressors,” she added. “Accumulating evidence suggests that the younger generations may be aging more swiftly than anticipated, likely due to earlier exposure to various risk factors and environmental insults. However, the impact of accelerated aging on early-onset cancer development remains unclear.”
People born in or after 1965 had a 17% higher likelihood of accelerated aging than those born between 1950 and 1954. Next, the team looked at the link between accelerated aging and the risk of early-onset cancers. It found that each standard deviation increase in accelerated aging was associated with a 42% increased risk of early-onset lung cancer, a 22% increased risk of early-onset gastrointestinal cancer and a 36% increased risk of early-onset uterine cancer.
Accelerated aging didn’t have a big impact on the risk of late-onset lung cancer, which is cancer diagnosed after age 55; but it was associated with a 16% and 23% increased risk of late-onset gastrointestinal and uterine cancers, respectively.
“By examining the relationship between accelerating aging and the risk of early-onset cancers, we provide a fresh perspective on the shared etiology of early-onset cancers,” Tian said. “If validated, our findings suggest that interventions to slow biological aging could be a new avenue for cancer prevention, and screening efforts tailored to younger individuals with signs of accelerated aging could help detect cancers early.”
Recent news that the British monarchy’s Kate Middleton, who is 42 and has cancer, has sparked general interest and analysis about cancer diagnoses among younger people.
