ReviewEnvironmental epigenetics2023
Epigenetic clocks and research implications of the lack of data on whom they have been developed: a review of reported and missing sociodemographic characteristics.
Review in Environmental epigenetics, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
22 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Epigenetic Signatures of Frailty: A Systematic Review, Meta-Analysis, and Network Analysis of the Chemical Exposome.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Pooled it
- Paediatric DNA methylation profile scores: a systematic review and open-source atlas.EBioMedicine · 2026Pooled it
- Exploring Epigenetic Aging and Cognitive Change in Middle Adulthood.The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences · 2026Article
- Article
- Article
- BRIDGING THE GAP: ENHANCING THE GENERALIZABILITY OF EPIGENETIC CLOCKS THROUGH TRANSFER LEARNING.The annals of applied statistics · 2026Article
- KoMethylNet: a novel epigenetic clock based on neural network analysis of DNA methylation data and epigenetic age acceleration in a Korean population.BMC medicine · 2025Article
- What's counted counts: the implications of underrepresentation for the application of epigenetic clocks in diverse populations.Clinical epigenetics · 2025Review
- The impact of artificial intelligence on biomarker discovery.Emerging topics in life sciences · 2025Article
- Prenatal exposure to genocide accelerates epigenetic aging in third- and fourth-generation clocks among young adults in Rwanda.Communications medicine · 2025Article
- Red Blood Cells and Human Aging: Exploring Their Biomarker Potential.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Tracking Epigenetic Biomarkers of Health and Aging During the Initial Year of Gender-Affirming Hormone Therapy.The Yale journal of biology and medicine · 2025Article
- Review
- Discrimination, Coping, and DNAm Accelerated Aging Among African American Mothers of the InterGEN Study.Epigenomes · 2025Article
- Depressive symptoms partially mediate the relationship between psychosocial factors and epigenetic age acceleration in a multi-racial/ethnic sample of older adults.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2025Article
- Influence of race, ethnicity, and sex on the performance of epigenetic predictors of phenotypic traits.Clinical epigenetics · 2025Article
- Major experiences of perceived discrimination across life and biological aging.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Article
- Quantification of Epigenetic Aging in Public Health.Annual review of public health · 2025Review
- Gerotherapeutics: aging mechanism-based pharmaceutical and behavioral interventions to reduce cancer racial and ethnic disparities.Journal of the National Cancer Institute · 2025Review
- DNA methylation and prediction of biological age.Frontiers in molecular biosciences · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Epigenetic clocks are increasingly being used as a tool to assess the impact of a wide variety of phenotypes and exposures on healthy ageing, with a recent focus on social determinants of health. However, little attention has been paid to the sociodemographic characteristics of participants on whom these clocks have been based. Participant characteristics are important because sociodemographic and socioeconomic factors are known to be associated with both DNA methylation variation and healthy ageing. It is also well known that machine learning algorithms have the potential to exacerbate health inequities through the use of unrepresentative samples - prediction models may underperform in social groups that were poorly represented in the training data used to construct the model. To address this gap in the literature, we conducted a review of the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants whose data were used to construct 13 commonly used epigenetic clocks. We found that although some of the epigenetic clocks were created utilizing data provided by individuals from different ages, sexes/genders, and racialized groups, sociodemographic characteristics are generally poorly reported. Reported information is limited by inadequate conceptualization of the social dimensions and exposure implications of gender and racialized inequality, and socioeconomic data are infrequently reported. It is important for future work to ensure clear reporting of tangible data on the sociodemographic and socioeconomic characteristics of all the participants in the study to ensure that other researchers can make informed judgements about the appropriateness of the model for their study population.
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What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.