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Aging is the result of the accumulation of a wide variety of molecular and cellular damages over time, meaning that "the more damage we accumulate, the higher the possibility to develop age-related diseases". Therefore, to reduce the incidence of such diseases and improve human health, it becomes important to find ways to combat such damage. In this sense, geroprotectors have been suggested as molecules that could slow down or prevent age-related diseases. On the other hand, nutraceuticals are another set of compounds that align with the need to prevent diseases and promote health since they are biologically active molecules (occurring naturally in food) that, apart from having a nutritional role, have preventive properties, such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antitumoral, just to mention a few. Therefore, in the present review using the specialized databases Scopus and PubMed we collected information from articles published from 2010 to 2023 in order to describe the role of nutraceuticals during the aging process and, given their role in targeting the hallmarks of aging, we suggest that they are potential geroprotectors that could be consumed as part of our regular diet or administered additionally as nutritional supplements.

Background: Peripheral biomarkers associated with neurocognitive disorders (NCD) have been evaluated in an attempt to improve diagnosis and early detection and potentially even prevent them. Along with increasing age, type 2 diabetes (T2D) increases the risk of central nervous system disorders and cognitive impairment due to the loss of synaptic function. Central damage triggers an astroglial response, increasing the expression of glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), which can be found peripherally when the blood-brain barrier is compromised., Aim of the Study: To evaluate the value of GFAP as a peripheral biomarker of central dysfunction., Methods: Serum levels of GFAP were compared between cases of NCD (n = 69) and age-matched controls (n = 69), analyzing the influence of diabetes as contributing factor., Results: We found higher levels of serum GFAP in subjects with NCD compared with the control group (p <0.0001). The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve using the GFAP levels showed 65.22% sensitivity and 71.01% specificity (AUC = 0.7608), indicating good performance in the classification of controls and NCD patients. Logistic regression indicated a positive predictive power of 67.50% considering T2D status; adding GFAP levels, the predictive power rises to 71.93%. GFAP levels and T2D could be considered good predictors of NCD risk., Conclusions: Our findings open the possibility that peripheral GFAP could be used as an objective measurement related, under certain conditions, to central damage; thereby serving as a follow-up marker to refer diabetic patients for appropriate neurological evaluation, which could offer a low cost, minimally invasive strategy to improve the assessment of cognitive affectation and subsequent treatment., Competing Interests: Conflict of Interest All authors have no conflict of interest to declare., (Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Inc.)