Could your address be speeding up your biological clock?
Are you ageing faster because of where you live? In a paper published in the journal ‘Cell’(opens in new window), a team of researchers led by the Stanford University School of Medicine in the United States explain why location might be changing how fast we age.
Location, location, longevity
To better understand how ethnicity and geography affect human biology, the researchers recruited and analysed 322 healthy participants from around the world who had European, East Asian and South Asian ancestry. These people shared similar ancestry, despite living on different continents. Rather than focusing solely on DNA, the research team examined a broad range of health markers, from proteins to gut bacteria. Together, these indicators enabled them to construct a comprehensive profile of each participant’s biological health. “For the first time we have deeply profiled people from around the world,” co-senior author Michael Snyder, professor of genetics at the Stanford School of Medicine, commented in a news release(opens in new window). “This enables us to see what properties such as metabolites and microbes are correlated with ethnicity and which ones with geography.” The results revealed that moving to a new part of the world isn’t enough to overwrite our biological history. People with the same heritage maintained similar genetic, metabolic and gut health patterns, even when living thousands of kilometres apart. European participants had richer gut microbial diversity and higher levels of chemicals tied to heart disease risk. Interestingly, when those same individuals lived outside the continent, they showed the opposite trend, appearing biologically younger.
Biology without borders
The study’s most compelling discovery was how deeply where we live impacts our biological age – a measure of how well our bodies, cells and organs are functioning compared to the average person of our chronological age. It reflects the wear and tear a body has experienced over the years. “What this study shows, more clearly than ever before, is that our biology is shaped by a combination of both our genetic ancestry and the places we live,” explained co‑author Richard Unwin, professor of disease proteomics at The University of Manchester, in a news item(opens in new window). “We were struck by how consistently ethnicity influenced immunity, metabolism and the microbiome, even when people moved thousands of miles away. However, it is equally clear that where we live can have substantial impacts on nudging key molecular pathways — even how our cells appear to age — in different directions depending on who you are. It proves that precision medicine must reflect real global diversity, not a single population.” The researchers generated an open-access dataset to empower scientists and clinicians in designing more precise diagnostics, treatments and preventive strategies that consider an individual’s genetic ancestry, environment and unique biology. Showing that our health treatments should account for the complex interplay between our unique genetic background and surroundings, study findings will pave the way for a new era of medicine.
