Tracking the stages of aging in 40,000 dogs

All dog owners want to help their best friend live a longer and healthier life. To accomplish this, a better understanding of the aging process in dogs is needed. The Dog Aging Project brings together a community of dogs, owners, veterinarians, researchers and volunteers to advance this understanding. As a result, tens of thousands of owners across the US have been given a chance to actually help make their dream a reality.

Largest canine health study in the world

Since the launch of the Dog Aging Project (DAP) in 2019, more than 40,000 dogs have been enrolled in what is now the largest canine health study in the world. The project is being conducted by the Texas A&M School of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences (VMBS), the University of Washington (UW) School of Medicine, and a dozen other partner institutions. It is supported by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) of the US National Institutes of Health.

Learning about healthy aging – in dogs and humans

Ultimately, the varied, rich and complex data collected through the project will allow the team to characterize aging in companion dogs, resulting in metrics that do not currently exist. To generate that data, owners are using tests developed by the DAP scientists to measure changes in physical function as their dogs age.

There are similar tests for aging humans, like moving from seated to standing, gripping devices, or age-specific normal ranges on blood chemistry values. For dogs, however, aside from owner observations, there are few standardized assessments.

Dr. Francesca Macchiarini, chief of the biological resources branch in NIA’s Division of Aging Biology, describes this project as an innovative approach to understand the process of aging: “We’re going to learn more in a relatively shorter period of time than we would by studying the human population – a lot about how biology, lifestyle and environment can affect healthy aging in dogs and then have that be applicable to humans.”

Clinical trial

One of the project’s most exciting components is the Test of Rapamycin in Aging Dogs (TRIAD) study, a clinical trial that will involve select veterinary sites across the US. In hundreds of middle-aged, large- breed dogs, TRIAD will evaluate the effectiveness of rapamycin, which at lower doses has been shown to increase lifespan, improve heart and cognitive function, and reduce age-related disease in laboratory species.

This will provide the first clinical evaluation of an intervention that may increase lifespan and health span based on this approach.

Biological aging

Dr. Matt Kaeberlein, a UW professor and co-director of the Dog Aging Project, says that targeting biological aging is 21st-century medicine, with the potential to greatly enhance healthy longevity for both people and pets. Because the project is an open-data study, scientists around the world and from many different fields will have access to the massive amount of data generated, as well as the opportunity to contribute to the study in a variety of ways, based on their interests. For example, one key contributor is noted canine and archaic human genome science researcher Joshua Akey of Princeton University.