Research Paper

Figure 2. Impact of HIV on epigenetic age acceleration across multiple cohorts and treatment Phases. (A) Scatter plots comparing epigenetic age acceleration (EAA) across multiple epigenetic clocks: EpiAge, DNAmAge, DNAmAgeHannum, DNAmPhenoAge, DNAmAgeSkinBloodClock, DNAGrimAge v1, and DNAGrimAge v2, between HIV-negative individuals from the GSE67751 cohort (n=69) and HIV-positive individuals from cohorts GSE67751 (n=23), GSE117859 (n=609), GSE53840 (n=120), and GSE185391 (n=86). The plots display median EAA values, with error bars denoting 95% Confidence Intervals (CI). The significance of differences in EAA was tested using unpaired, two-tailed t-tests. A horizontal line at zero on the plot marks the threshold between age acceleration and deceleration; points above this line indicate epigenetic age acceleration, while points below indicate deceleration. (B) These scatter plots track changes in EAA from baseline (week 0) through weeks 1, 6, 10, and 24 of a combined HIV treatment strategy, which includes therapeutic vaccination and a latency-reversing agent using multiple epigenetic clocks. We employed repeated measures ANOVA for the analysis. To address potential deviations from the assumption of sphericity, we applied the Geisser-Greenhouse correction as determined by Mauchly’s test. This correction ensures accurate and reliable results in repeated measures analysis, particularly when the equality of variances across the differences between all pairs of groups is not met. (C) These scatter plots focus on comparing epigenetic age acceleration (EAA) from baseline (week 0) to the monitored antiretroviral pause (MAP) phase of the BCN02 clinical trial, using various epigenetic clocks: EpiAge, DNAmAge, DNAmAgeHannum, DNAmPhenoAge, DNAmAgeSkinBloodClock, DNAGrimAge v1, and DNAGrimAge v2. Differences were assessed using paired two-tailed t-tests, chosen for their appropriateness given the normal distribution of data.