AI tool uses face photos to estimate biological age and predict cancer outcomes
AI tool uses face photos to estimate biological age and predict cancer outcomes
Mass General Brigham - Technology & Innovation - Research; by Hugo Alerts, Ray Mak, Dennis Bontempi, Osbert Zalay, Danielle S. Bitterman, Fridolin Haugg, Jack M. Qian, Hannah Roberts, Subha Perni, Vasco Prudente, Suraj Pai, Christian Guthier, Tracy Balboni, Laura Warren, Monica Krishan, and Benjamin H. Kann; 5/8/25
Mass General Brigham findings suggest FaceAge tool could provide objective data to help inform treatment decisions in cancer care and other chronic diseases. Eyes may be the window to the soul, but a person’s biological age could be reflected in their facial characteristics. Investigators from Mass General Brigham developed a deep learning algorithm called FaceAge that uses a photo of a person’s face to predict biological age and survival outcomes for patients with cancer. They found that patients with cancer, on average, had a higher FaceAge than those without and appeared about five years older than their chronological age. Older FaceAge predictions were associated with worse overall survival outcomes across multiple cancer types. They also found that FaceAge outperformed clinicians in predicting short-term life expectancies of patients receiving palliative radiotherapy. Their results are published in The Lancet Digital Health.
Editor's note: This summary article is published by the main source, Mass General Brigham. Various articles are being written about this new use of AI.
- The Lancet Digital Health (the full research article): FaceAge, a deep learning system to estimate biological age from face photographs to improve prognostication: a model development and validation study
- The New York Times: Can a photograph help predict who will survive cancer treatment?
- The Washington Post: New AI tool predicts your biological age from a selfie
- Health Medicine Network: HMN2025 - How AI instrument makes use of selfies to foretell organic age and cancer survival
- Inside Precision Medicine - Patient Care: AI tool predicts cancer survival from face photos
- Bioengineer: AI tool analyzes facial images to estimate biological age and forecast cancer prognosis