Negative Association of Serum Uric Acid with Peripheral Blood Cellular Aging Markers

We aimed to explore the association between serum UA and cellular aging markers.

The current cross-sectional analysis was based on data collected within a type 2 diabetes project.

Serum uric acid (UA), which has both antioxidant and pro-oxidant properties, is thought to be involved in cellular aging processes.

There are 536 participants included in total, 65.3% of which are women. The average serum UA in women was 267.8 umol/l, lower than in men of 337.7 umol/l (P<0.001).

Serum UA, blood lipid profile, HbA1c, plasma glucose and insulin were determined. The peripheral blood leukocyte telomere length (LTL) and mitochondrial DNA copy number (mtDNAcn) were assessed using a real-time PCR assay. Logistic regressions were used to analyze the associations between serum UA and cellular aging markers.

In Spearman’s correlation analysis, there were significantly negative correlations between serum UA and LTL in both women and men (r=−0.162, P=0.006; and r=−0.232, P=0.004, respectively). The logistic regression adjusted for age, BMI, WC, daily energy intake, HbA1c, TG, and LDL-C revealed that the ORs of shorter LTL comparing the extreme serum UA quintiles was 5.52 (95% CI 1.69–18.02; P for trend =0.025) in women and 6.49 (95% CI 1.38–30.45; P for trend =0.108) in men. Furthermore, the OR (95% CI) for shorter LTL per 1 SD increment in serum UA was 1.51(1.10–2.07) in women and 1.64(1.01–2.65) in men. In regard to mtDNAcn, the association between elevated serum UA and lower mtDNAcn only reached significance in men when comparing the second and fifth quintiles with reference quintile (OR=3.73(1.07–13.04) and 3.76(1.01–14.09), separately, and P for trend=0.066).

Our results indicate a significant negative association between serum UA and peripheral blood cellular aging markers. Serum UA might play a role in promoting cellular aging.