1. What Is the FAST Project?
Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health has received a major research award. It is part of the PROactive Solutions for Prolonging Resilience (PROSPR) program under the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H). This funding supports research on the biological hallmarks of aging — and how to slow them down.
The project is called FAST. Led by Daniel Belsky, PhD, Associate Professor of Epidemiology at Columbia Mailman, FAST integrates clinical and biological data from multiple already-completed clinical trials. Its purpose is to discover novel biomarkers that reveal how specific drugs affect the biology of aging. Rather than launching new trials, FAST mines existing data for powerful new insights.
2. Why Healthy Aging Research Matters Now
Life expectancy has risen dramatically over recent decades. However, the number of years people spend in good health has not kept pace. Chronic diseases now affect more Americans than ever — particularly as they age. This gap drives rising healthcare costs and reduces quality of life for millions of people.
Current medicine largely treats disease after it appears. The ARPA-H–funded FAST project takes a different approach. It shifts medicine from reactive treatment to proactive prevention. The goal is to stop decline before it begins.
“Current treatments focus on managing diseases after they emerge. Our goal is to identify measurable biological signals that show when interventions are slowing the aging process itself — so we can preserve health, independence, and quality of life as people grow older.”
— Dr. Daniel Belsky, Columbia Mailman School of Public Health
3. How FAST Analyzes Existing Clinical Trials
The five-year PROSPR program aims to transform geriatric medicine into a personalized, preventive model. To achieve this, FAST analyzes data and biospecimens from completed clinical trials. This approach is both efficient and scientifically powerful. It avoids the cost and time of new trials while still producing breakthrough insights.
What Types of Data Does FAST Use?
FAST integrates multiple data streams to build its biomarker profile. These include clinical trial results, biological specimens, proteomic data, metabolomic data, epigenetic markers, and biostatistical models. Together, these sources give researchers a comprehensive view of how drugs interact with the biology of aging in humans.
4. Key Drugs That Target the Biology of Aging
FAST currently incorporates trials involving four of five priority drug classes. Each drug targets core biological drivers of aging. Moreover, each has shown life-extending effects in animal models. These drugs were originally approved for specific conditions — yet they show broader benefits across multiple diseases in humans.
The Four Priority Drug Classes
Metformin — a widely used diabetes drug that activates anti-aging cellular pathways.
SGLT-2 Inhibitors — originally designed for diabetes, with added heart and kidney protective benefits.
GLP-1 Agonists — medications that regulate blood sugar and weight, with emerging aging benefits.
Rapamycin — an immunosuppressant that inhibits the mTOR pathway, a key regulator of cellular aging.
Furthermore, these findings will inform other PROSPR teams as they design future clinical trials targeting aging processes.
5. Early Findings and Promising Results
Early results from FAST trials are already generating excitement in the scientific community. Preliminary findings suggest rapamycin may slow ovarian aging by approximately 20 percent. As a result, this drug could potentially extend fertility by up to five years. In addition, other trials show improvements in cardiovascular biomarkers and better patient-reported health outcomes. Researchers have also observed reduced progression to diabetes across multiple studies.
“The FAST/ARPA-H project will change how we measure and treat aging. Older adults will soon visit clinics, learn their biological age, receive targeted interventions, and see themselves getting younger within months. At the same time, biotech innovators will gain a powerful way to tell early in trials whether their drugs work — speeding the creation of therapies that truly extend healthy life.”
— Dr. Nir Barzilai, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
6. The Research Team and Institutional Partners
FAST brings together experts from five leading institutions. The team spans aging biology, clinical trials, proteomics, metabolomics, epigenetics, biostatistics, and computational biology. Dr. Daniel Belsky serves as principal investigator, coordinating a diverse group of researchers across the country.
Co-Leaders and Key Collaborators
Co-leadership comes from Dr. Nir Barzilai of Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Dr. Mahdi Moqri of Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Zohn Rosen of Columbia Mailman School serves as project manager.
Columbia co-collaborators include Aris Floratos (Systems Biology), Yousin Suh (OBGYN), Zhonghua Liu (Biostatistics), and Gary Miller (Environmental Health Sciences). Outside partners include teams at Duke University, Saint Luke’s Health System, NovoNordisk, the proteomics company OLink, and the epigenetics company TruDiagnostic.
Notably, FAST was originally incubated by the American Federation for Aging Research before receiving ARPA-H funding through the PROSPR initiative.
7. Open Data Access Through the Columbia Data Platform
All FAST data will be available to qualified researchers through the Columbia Data Platform (CDP). This secure, cloud-based infrastructure operates via Redivis on Google Cloud. Open access enables broad collaboration and rapid discovery. Consequently, findings can reach the wider research community faster — shortening the timeline from discovery to treatment.
8. What This Means for the Future of Medicine
The FAST project marks a turning point for aging science. Instead of asking whether individual drugs work for single diseases, researchers now address a much larger question: can we measure — and ultimately extend — the years people spend in good health?
“This project is exciting because it moves the science of aging from theory to action. By combining data from multiple clinical trials, we have a rare opportunity to identify clear biological signals of what actually slows aging in humans — and to use that knowledge to prevent disease before it begins.”
— Dr. Daniel Belsky, Principal Investigator
Furthermore, the shift toward preventive, personalized aging medicine could reshape healthcare for an entire generation. As biological age testing becomes routine, patients will receive targeted interventions earlier. They will stay healthier longer. This approach has the potential to reduce healthcare costs, improve independence, and extend quality of life for millions of aging adults worldwide.
9. SEO & Content Metadata
3-Word Summary Phrase: Aging Biology BreakthroughTwo-Sentence Summary: Columbia University’s FAST project uses data from completed clinical trials to identify biological markers that reveal how specific drugs slow the aging process. Funded by ARPA-H’s PROSPR program, this initiative aims to transform aging medicine into a preventive, personalized model that extends healthy years of life.
