DNA methylation age from peripheral blood predicts progression to Alzheimer’s disease, white matter disease burden, and cortical atrophy

Cross-sectional studies suggest a limited relationship between accelerated epigenetic aging derived from epigenetic clocks, and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathophysiology or risk. However, most prior analyses have not utilized longitudinal analyses or whole-brain neuroimaging biomarkers of AD. Herein, we employed longitudinal modeling and structural neuroimaging analyses to test the hypothesis that accelerated epigenetic aging would predict AD progression. Using survival analyses, we found that two second generation epigenetic clocks, DNAmPhenoAge and DNAmGrimAge, predicted progression from cognitively normal aging to mild cognitive impairment or AD and worse longitudinal cognitive outcomes. Epigenetic age was also strongly associated with cortical thinning in AD-relevant regions and white matter disease burden. Thus, in contrast to earlier work suggesting limited applicability of blood-based epigenetic clocks in AD, our novel analytic framework suggests that second-generation epigenetic clocks have broad utility and may represent promising predictors of AD risk and pathophysiology.