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Research Paper|Volume 18|pp 138—158

Plant-based dietary patterns are associated with slower epigenetic aging

Hyunju Kim1,2, Christina A. Castellani3,4, Jiantao Ma5, Alexis C. Wood6, Audrey Ting7, Morgan E. Grams8, Bing Yu9, Kelly Ruggles10, James S. Floyd1,2,11, Dan E. Arking12, Casey M. Rebholz7,13,14
  • 1Department of Epidemiology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98105, USA
  • 2Cardiovascular Health Research Unit, Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98105, USA
  • 3Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Schulich Medicine & Dentistry, Western University, Ontario N6A5C1, Canada
  • 4Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Schulich Medicine & Dentistry, Western University, Ontario NA5C1, Canada
  • 5Division of Nutritional Epidemiology and Data Science, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University, Boston, MA 02111, USA
  • 6USDA/ARS Children’s Nutrition Research Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX 77030, USA
  • 7Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
  • 8Division of Precision Medicine, New York University Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA
  • 9Department of Epidemiology, University of Texas Health Sciences Center at Houston School of Public Health, Houston, TX 77030, USA
  • 10Department of Medicine, New York University Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA
  • 11Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98105, USA
  • 12Department of Genetic Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
  • 13Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology, and Clinical Research, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
  • 14Department of Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Received: October 9, 2025Accepted: January 30, 2026Published: March 20, 2026
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.206362

Copyright: © 2026 Kim et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

Greater adherence to plant-based diets is associated with health benefits. Dietary intake can modify DNA methylation patterns, but it is unknown whether plant-based diets in a largely non-vegetarian population are associated with DNA methylation-based epigenetic aging measures. We examined the associations between 4 different types of plant-based diets indices (PDI) [overall PDI, provegetarian diet, healthy PDI, and unhealthy PDI] and epigenetic aging. We used data from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study (N=2,810) and National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES, N=2,056). PDIs negatively scored higher intake of animal products and positively scored higher intake of all or selected plant foods (overall PDI and provegetarian diet), healthy plant foods (healthy PDI), and unhealthy plant foods (unhealthy PDI). Associations were examined with GrimAge version2, HannumAge, and PhenoAge in each study. Estimates were meta-analyzed using fixed effects model. Each standard deviation (SD) higher in the overall PDI, provegetarian diet, and healthy PDI was associated with decelerated GrimAge2 (range of β = -0.28 to -0.16, P for all tests <0.05). Higher overall PDI and provegetarian diet was associated with decelerated PhenoAge and HannumAge (overall PDI only). No significant association was observed for unhealthy PDI. Following diets rich in plant foods and low in animal products may slow biological aging.