Genes and longevity: Lessons from studies of centenarians

In population studies of aging, the data on genetic markers are often colle cted for individuals from different age groups. The idea of such studies is to identify "longevity" or "frailty" genes by comparing the frequencies of genotypes in the oldest and in the younger groups of individuals. In this paper we discuss a new approach to the analysis of such data. This approach , based on the maximum likelihood method, combines data on genetic markers with survival information obtained from standard demographic life tables. T his method allows us to evaluate survival characteristics for individuals c arrying respective candidate genes. It can also be used in the estimation o f the effects of allele-area and allele-allele interaction, either in the p resence or absence of hidden heterogeneity. We apply this method to the ana lysis of Italian data on genetic markers for five autosomal loci and mitoch ondrial genomes, Then we discuss basic assumptions used in this analysis an d directions of further research.