Background
All humans share the experience of aging. However, our reliance on calculating age purely through chronological time can be misleading, as aging is a complex biological and physiological process that does not always move linearly with time. Because many underlying variables remain “invisible” or “unknown” to us, some individuals are often unaware of their own premature senescence.
This research constructs a framework that makes use of data to inform the public of the underlying variables that drive aging beyond chronological time. We also aim at providing actionable insights into biomarker reversal and methods that may help to identify at-risk individuals with premature aging. Ultimately, we believe this project serves both as a resource for general public knowledge and as a foundation for future development within a clinical context.
Dataset Overview
“Moderate–vigorous physical activity attenuates premature senescence of immune cells in sedentary adults with obesity” is a dataset containing demographic, anthropometric, behavioral, and cellular senescence variables (in particular, p16 and p21) from 45 sedentary adults with obesity. To follow the direction of the research paper, our analysis also focuses on the p16 and p21 biomarkers to determine biological aging in individuals. The participants then went through a 12-week intervention period with prescribed moderate-to-vigorous activity (MVPA), assessing its effects on the reversal of senescence biomarkers. Variables such as waist circumference, BMI, and sleep duration were recorded before the intervention. Body and biomarker changes were also documented for further analysis
Acknowledgement
We would like to express our gratitude to the dataset owners. We also extend our thanks to our coaches, Dr. KC Wong and Mr. Jack Ng, for their guidance and support throughout our projects. Finally, we are grateful to the Digital Scholarship Team for making this project possible.
This project was developed and researched by Asset Yermukhanbet (CSCI/3) and Leo Yan (IBBA/3).
References
[1] Chen, Xiang-Ke et al. “Moderate-Vigorous Physical Activity Attenuates Premature Senescence of Immune Cells in Sedentary Adults with Obesity: A Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial.” Aging, vol. 14, no. 24, 2022, pp. 10137–52, https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.204458.
[2] Penn State Eberly College of Science. “9.4 – Studentized Residuals.” Applied Regression Analysis, the Pennsylvania State University, https://online.stat.psu.edu/stat462/node/247/