DNA Methylation Clock Ages Across Blood and Saliva Tissues in 91 Adults

91 individuals from the Colorado Adoption/Twin Study of Lifespan behavioral development and cognitive aging (CATSLife1) provided samples for comparing 15 DNA methylation clocks across saliva, buffy coat, and peripheral blood mononuclear cells. Mean Spearman correlations between chronological age and DNA methylation ages were moderate, ranging from r=0.34 to r=0.40 across tissues. The dataset, authored by Ryan Bruellman and last updated in April 2026, shows saliva-based clocks yield older methylation ages than blood-based ones, while buffy coat and PBMC results are comparable.

Use Cases

• Benchmarking tissue-specific DNA methylation age predictions based on the comparison of 15 different epigenetic clocks.
• Investigating heritability of epigenetic aging based on correlations within monozygotic and dizygotic twin pairs.
• Assessing the substitutability of saliva versus blood samples for aging studies based on reported age acceleration differences.
• Evaluating next-generation clocks like DunedinPace for cross-tissue consistency as described in the findings.

Strengths

• Includes data from 91 individuals with a mean age of 30.90 years, providing a sample in early-to-mid adulthood.
• Compares 15 distinct DNA methylation clocks across three tissue types (saliva, buffy coat, PBMC).
• Leverages a twin/sibling design with 18 monozygotic and 14 dizygotic pairs to assess heritability.
• Published under a permissive CC-BY-4.0 license, allowing for reuse and redistribution.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for certain analyses.
• The 2.7 MB file size suggests a relatively small dataset, potentially limiting statistical power for some inferences.

Provenance

Source

figshare, author Ryan Bruellman.

Collection Method

Data collected from participants in the Colorado Adoption/Twin Study of Lifespan behavioral development and cognitive aging (CATSLife1).

Time Range

Sample collection timeframe not specified; dataset reflects a study of adults aged 28.07–41.13 years.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-15 19:01:21; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Likely based in Colorado, USA, given the study name, but not explicitly confirmed.