Dan T. A. Eisenberg, Judith B. Borja, M. Geoffrey Hayes, Christopher W. Kuzawa
Objectives: Telomeres are repetitive DNA at chromosomes ends that shorten with age due to cellular replication and oxidative stress. As telomeres shorten, this can eventually place limits on cell replication and contribute to senescence. Infections are common during early development and activate cellular immune responses that involve clonal expansion and oxidative stress. As such, a high infectious disease burden might shorten blood telomere length (BTL) and accelerate the pace of immune senescence. Methods: To test this, BTL measured in young adults (21.7 ± 0.3 years old) from the Philippines (N = 1,759) were linked to prospectively collected early life data on infectious burden. Results: As predicted, increased early life diarrheal prevalence was associated with shorter adult BTL. The association was most marked for infections experienced from 6 to 12 months, which corresponds with weaning and maximal diarrheal burden. A standard deviation increase in infections at 6–12 m predicts a 45 bp decrease in BTL, equivalent to 3.3 years of adult telomeric aging in this population. Contrary to expectations, breastfeeding duration was not associated with BTL, nor did effects vary by sex. Conclusions: These findings show that infancy diarrheal disease predicts a marker of cellular aging in adult immune cells. These findings suggest that early life infectious burden may influence late life health, or alternatively, that short TL in early life increases infectious disease susceptibility. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Department of Anthropology, University of Washington, United States; Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology, University of Washington, United States; USC-Office of Population Studies Foundation, University of San Carlos, Cebu City, Philippines; Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, University of San Carlos, Cebu City, Philippines; Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Molecular Medicine, Department of Medicine, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, United States; Center for Genetic Medicine, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, United States; Department of Anthropology, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, United States; Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, United States
