Key points from article :
Genetic ties seen between age-related diseases (ARDs) and candidate drugs for upstream intervention.
Using UK Biobank, team identified age-of-onset profiles for 116 diseases.
25 diseases appear much more frequently after age 40; 11 were cardiovascular.
51 diseases begin to rise at the age of 20, but at a slower rate; 17 were musculoskeletal.
This illustrates overall susceptibility to diseases rising with age.
30 diseases are distributed mostly equally across various age cohorts; all with immune component.
10 diseases mostly affect children; largest group being infectious diseases.
~94,000 polymorphic sites showed associations with at least one disease.
80 diseases had at least one significant association with a polymorphic site.
Identified 14 existing drugs that target common genetic causes of multiple ARDs.
Evidence found for 2 evolutionary theories of ageing: mutation accumulation and antagonistic pleiotropy.
Researchers from European Bioinformatics Institute and UCL, published in medRxiv.
