The research highlights a correlation between accelerated aging and declining overall health, with faster agers being more frail and at greater risk for chronic diseases and mortality.

In trials, the method successfully identified individuals likely to develop dementia and other chronic diseases before clinical symptoms appeared.

The research team emphasizes the potential of DunedinPACNI to evaluate interventions and possibly prevent disease progression, although further studies are necessary before clinical application.

The tool effectively captures social determinants of health, revealing that lower educational and income levels correlate with faster aging scores.

Researchers from Duke University, Harvard, and the University of Otago have developed a groundbreaking tool called DunedinPACNI, which estimates the speed of aging through a single MRI brain scan.

This innovative tool was trained on data from over 1,000 participants of the Dunedin Study, which has tracked their health changes since birth and analyzed their brain scans at age 45.

DunedinPACNI can predict midlife risks for chronic diseases and dementia years before symptoms manifest, allowing for potential lifestyle changes to improve health outcomes.

By analyzing brain structure using over 50,000 scans, the tool provides insights into a person's biological age, which may differ significantly from their chronological age.

The study found that individuals assessed as aging faster exhibited worse cognitive performance, greater hippocampal shrinkage, and were 60% more likely to develop dementia later in life.

These findings are particularly significant as the global population over 65 is expected to double by 2050, leading to increased incidences of age-related diseases like dementia.

The researchers are working to transition DunedinPACNI from a research tool to a practical application in healthcare, aiming to identify high-risk individuals for timely interventions.

The algorithm behind DunedinPACNI is available for free to researchers, facilitating further studies on aging and potential anti-aging interventions.