Research

Hormonal

Chronic low-grade inflammation (inflammaging) drives vascular aging by promoting oxidative stress, endothelial dysfunction, and atherosclerosis through the upregulation of cytokines like TNF-alpha and NF-kB activation.

Chronic, low-grade inflammation is a major driver of heart disease in older adults. It damages blood vessels by promoting oxidative stress and cell death. Managing inflammation through lifestyle factors is a key strategy for preventing age-related vascular disease.

StrongSupportsVERY_HIGH confidence
Abundant experimental and clinical data show that aging is associated with chronic low-grade inflammation (34), which predisposes the vasculature to the development of atherosclerosis... High levels of inflammatory cytokines contribute to a proinflammatory microenvironment that facilitates both the development of vascular dysfunction (42, 43) and promotes endothelial apoptosis in aging (21, 42).
Zoltán Ungvári et al. · The Journals of Gerontology Series A · 2010

Why this rating

Supported by abundant experimental and clinical data, including human plasma marker correlations.

Source

Mechanisms of Vascular Aging: New Perspectives

Zoltán Ungvári et al. · The Journals of Gerontology Series A · 2010

DOI 10.1093/gerona/glq113

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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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