Table 1.

Critical Areas of Aging Research

	Important goals
Adaptation to Stress	Bridge continuum from psychological to molecular stresses
	Differentiate hormesis from toxic stress
	Better align human and animal studies
Epigenetics	Biomarker development: chronologic vs. biologic aging
	Link age-related environmental inputs to epigenetic signatures
	Test small molecules that regulate enzymes controlling epigenetic events
Inflammation	Differentiate adaptive and maladaptive inflammatory responses
	Define age-related inflammatory sources and their systemic effects
	Determine how obesity and metabolic dysfunction alter inflammation with age
Macromolecular Damage	Generate systems level understanding of the role of types of macromolecular damage and their roles in chronic disease states.
	Understand how stochastic damage influences the variability of aging
Metabolism	Define role of signal transduction pathways linked to metabolism in aging processes
	Understand contribution of circadian clocks to aging and metabolism
	Connect metabolic dysfunction with tissue-specific decline in aging
Proteostasis	Identify proteostatic pathways that are overwhelmed in specific chronic disease states.
	Examine crosstalk between proteostasis machineries
	Understand non-cell-autonomous signaling and activation of proteostasis pathways.
Stem Cells and Regeneration	Determine whether declining adult stem cell function drives aging and chronic disease
	Examine how aging and associated disease impair adult stem cell function.
	Determine how macromolecular damage accumulates in aging adult stem cell pools