Mayo Clinic has launched Precure Research, a new medical initiative designed to chart the hidden biological period between health and disease. By combining information from genes, proteins, metabolites, clinical data, wearable technologies, artificial intelligence (AI), and environmental exposures, the project aims to predict and intercept conditions like Alzheimer’s disease and heart failure before symptoms develop.
In Plain English: The Clinical Takeaway
- Precure Research: A new investigative approach that looks at biological clues long before symptoms appear.
- Multi-Omics and AI: Scientists are using advanced computing to analyze massive sets of genetic, protein, and metabolic data simultaneously.
- The Exposome: The initiative measures cumulative environmental factors—such as air, water, diet, pollutants, heavy metals, pesticides, physical activity, sleep, stress, noise, and light—that influence why diseases develop in certain individuals.
Charting the Hidden Preclinical Window
By the time a clinical diagnosis is made, many chronic conditions have been developing silently for years. The body leaves microscopic clues along the way, including shifting proteins, changing metabolism, evolving immune responses, and measurable environmental traces. Until recently, many of these early signals remained undetectable.
Mayo Clinic’s Precure Research initiative seeks to chart this hidden period between health and disease. The project focuses on creating opportunities to understand, predict, and potentially prevent conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease, heart failure, pulmonary fibrosis, chronic liver disease, and chronic kidney disease before symptoms develop.
The initiative integrates multiple layers of data. Researchers combine information from genes, proteins, metabolites, clinical data, wearable technologies, artificial intelligence (AI), and environmental exposures. This framework is designed to construct Mayo Clinic’s most extensive unified repository of biospecimens alongside health and scientific records to speed up the prediction and prevention of illnesses.
Early Discoveries in Cancer and Cardiology
The research ecosystem is already generating clinical findings. Mayo Clinic scientists have identified inherited risks for cancer and cardiovascular disease in nearly 2,000 individuals who had no previous indication they were at risk.
Other studies within the initiative show that certain precancerous changes can be detected years before cancer develops. Investigators have demonstrated that artificial intelligence models can help identify signs of pancreatic cancer years before a diagnosis. Similarly, subtle biological changes linked to Alzheimer’s disease begin decades before memory loss.
To spot hereditary heart problems ahead of clinical heart failure, researchers are utilizing wearable devices, genetics, and machine learning. “Genomics showed us the blueprint, the underlying architecture of human biology,” says Konstantinos Lazaridis, M.D., the Carlson and Nelson Endowed Executive Director, Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine and director of Precure Research. “Now we’re watching that structure in motion – shifting, adapting, unfolding over time, shaped by the world around us and inside us, ultimately influencing the unique lives we each live.”
Measuring the Human Exposome
Precure Research examines how environmental and lifestyle factors influence human health over an entire lifetime. Scientists define this cumulative influence as the exposome, which encompasses the sum of environmental exposures and their biological effects.
These influences include air, water, diet, pollutants, heavy metals, pesticides, physical activity, sleep, stress, noise, and light. “The air we breathe, the food we eat and the places we live leave a biological imprint,” Dr. Lazaridis says. “Understanding those accumulated influences is essential to understanding why disease develops in one person and not another.”
| Research Focus | Methodology | Primary Target |
|---|---|---|
| Genomics & Proteomics | Biospecimen analysis | Inherited cancer & cardiovascular risks |
| Artificial Intelligence | Large-scale dataset processing | Early pancreatic & Alzheimer’s detection |
| Exposome Tracking | Blood biomarker & geographic mapping | Environmental toxins & metabolic drivers |
Researchers can now measure many of these exposures directly in blood and other biospecimens. Early laboratory efforts focus heavily on heavy metals, pesticides, and microplastics. Investigators link these laboratory findings with geographic data to understand how residential environments influence long-term health outcomes.
The exposome framework also captures protective influences, including nutrients and bioactive compounds that may support physiological resilience. These compounds help regulate inflammation, aging, and metabolic function.
Extending Healthspan Across Major Organ Systems
The initial scope of Precure Research targets diseases affecting the brain, heart, kidneys, liver, and lungs. It also monitors core biological pathways, including inflammation, oxidative stress, aging, and metabolic dysfunction.
The ultimate long-term goal of the initiative is to extend healthspan—defined as the number of years a person lives in good health, free from chronic disease and disability. Precure Research is part of Mayo Clinic’s Bold. Forward. strategy to Cure, Connect and Transform healthcare.
“Precure Research marks the beginning of the next era of scientific discovery and its translation into patient care,” Dr. Lazaridis states. “We are building the analytical and clinical tools needed to investigate questions that medicine has long recognized but has not been able to fully answer in ways that directly benefit patients.”
