Protein Clock

This protein clock measures 491 protein values associated with youth. The most important use is to provide a measure to compare baseline with follow-up results to evaluate the effects of age management therapies. The expectation is that older people who reset their protein clocks to a profile associated with younger will be healthier and live longer. It can be useful in evaluating biological age, but in my experience it’s the improvement after a therapy that’s most important.

This was done as an early proof of concept. I am working to overcome some obstacles to offer this to researchers developing aging therapies with exceptional potential for much longer healthy lifespan, and perhaps someday to consumers.

It has a working prototype. The next step is to put it to a test with human subjects, and verify reproducability and other practical aspects.

World class scientists Benoit Lehallier (lead author of the paper below), Tony Wyss-Coray, Maxim Shokhirev, and Adiv Johnson are the architects of the innovative system.  Benoit helped me create a version of the protein clock based on his work.

I extracted data from a sample file containing 4884 protein values in blood provided by test provider SomaLogic, paired it up with the protein and coefficient data in the paper, ran 64 samples to calculate final scores for each, and plotted this graph showing a relationship between chron age and score.

Lower score is associated with youth. The idea is that an aging therapy would reset proteins to a more youthful state – i.e. lower the score.