New England Supercentenarian Study
Welcome to the New England Supercentenarian Study
The New England Supercentenarian Study is based at the Boston University School of Medicine and directly falls under the auspices of New England Centenarian Study, now in its thirteenth year and the largest study of centenarians and their families in the world.
Nicholas (97) and Anthony (110) Pierro at the United Nations in New York City
We recruit and enroll supercentenarians and their family members from throughout the world.
Supercentenarians, people age 110 years old and older, are extremely rare individuals. There are likely 60 or so in the United States and 200-300 world wide.
Under the guidance and supervision of the Boston University School of Medicine Institutional Review Board and under the direction of 2 board certified geriatricians who collectively have studied centenarians and their families for more than twenty years, the New England Supercentenarian Study has enrolled more than 60 supercentenarians ranging in age from 110 to 119 years.
This is by far and away the largest recruitment of these rare and remarkable individuals in the world.
Please see our “Summary of What’s Known” page. By virtue of their likely ability to markedly delay or escape age-related illnesses and frailty and their probable sharing of traits that enable such exceptional survival, supercentenarians are likely to be an important resource for discovering environmental, behavioral and genetic factors that predispose to longevity and decreased susceptibility to vascular and other lethal diseases associated with aging.
Given what we know so far, we are earnestly recruiting “supers” and their family members with the intention of discovering the genetic and environmental factors that facilitate their living to such extreme old age.
We are now fast approaching the number of supercentenarians that we need to conduct never-before performed molecular genetic studies to find the genes that help these individuals live to their incredible ages.
If you know of a supercentenarian and their family who might be interested, please contact us! You can do so either by phone (US: 617-638-6688, Toll Free for Canada and the US: 888-333-6327) or via our contact page.
