Clonal Hematopoiesis Accelerates Frailty and Functional Decline

Abstract

Frailty reflects declining physiological reserve across multiple organ systems with aging, yet the underlying biological mechanisms contributing to frailty remain poorly understood. We tested whether somatic mutations in the blood were associated with incident frailty and faster progression in 730,088 participants from UK Biobank, All of Us, BioVU and the Womens Health Initiative. We found that clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential (CHIP) and autosomal mosaic chromosomal alterations showed strong associations with frailty, whereas mosaic loss of chromosome X or Y did not. Findings were consistent across survey-based, directly measured and clinically assessed frailty, as well as healthspan phenotypes. A Tet2 mouse model demonstrated multisystem frailty-like functional decline and T-cell remodeling. In humans, T-cell activation-related proteins directly mediated the association between clonal hematopoiesis and frailty. Collectively, these findings support a model in which clonal hematopoiesis accelerates biological aging through immunosenescence.