Fountain of Youth?
Keep in mind, though, that the clock is a statistical model that shows a correlation between DNA methylation and cells’ age. There’s no knowledge of causation at this point, according to the study published Monday in Genome Biology. This means there’s still a ways to go before scientists can tap into this apparent fountain of youth.
Still, the theoretical applications are exciting to consider: narrowing down a list of murder suspects by determining his or her age from a blood sample. Or seeing how quickly various tissues are aging, so doctors may be able to identify cancer risks early on, and come up with highly individualized treatments.