Correction for both common and rare cell types in blood is important to identify genes that correlate with age.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Aging is a multifactorial process that affects multiple tissues and is characterized by changes in homeostasis over time, leading to increased morbidity. Whole blood gene expression signatures have been associated with aging and have been used to gain information on its biological mechanisms, which are still not fully understood. However, blood is composed of many cell types whose proportions in blood vary with age. As a result, previously observed associations between gene expression levels and aging might be driven by cell type composition rather than intracellular aging mechanisms. To overcome this, previous aging studies already accounted for major cell types, but the possibility that the reported associations are false positives driven by less prevalent cell subtype

SUBMITTER: Pellegrino-Coppola D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7958454 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature