Vivian Diaz
Aging researcher at the Barshop Institute in San Antonio who has worked for more than a decade on the mouse lifespan studies behind rapamycin's reputation as an anti-aging drug, including the Interventions Testing Program
Barshop Institute for Longevity and Aging Studies and Department of Cellular and Integrative Physiology, UT Health San Antonio (papers 2013–2026)
Vivian Diaz is a co-author of two Atlas studies from San Antonio. In FOK2014, mice fed rapamycin lived longer, and their livers showed large changes in which genes were switched on, a first look at what long-term rapamycin does inside an organ. In STR2022, from the National Institute on Aging Interventions Testing Program (ITP), which tests drugs in genetically mixed mice at three sites, male mice given rapamycin plus acarbose from 9 months of age lived longer than males on rapamycin alone in earlier cohorts, while in females the combination matched rapamycin alone. Both studies are in mice.
PubMed lists Diaz at the Barshop Institute in San Antonio on a long run of mouse aging studies. Several test rapamycin directly: it extended life and health in C57BL/6 mice (2013), it raised mortality in db/db mice, a model of type 2 diabetes (2015), and chronic rapamycin reduced age-related motor decline in a sex-dependent way (2026). Diaz is also a co-author on ITP reports on canagliflozin (2020) and on epicatechin, halofuginone and mitoglitazone (2025), and on a 2026 Nature study of genetic and body-wide trade-offs in aging and mortality.
These papers show steady work on the San Antonio mouse aging studies; Diaz's exact role in the team was not stated in the sources checked.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2014 | A | Mice fed rapamycin have an increase in lifespan associated with major changes in the liver transcriptome FOK2014 Co-author: mice fed rapamycin lived longer and showed large changes in the liver transcriptome. |
| 2022 | A | Lifespan benefits for the combination of rapamycin plus acarbose and for captopril in genetically heterogeneous mice STR2022 Co-author from the San Antonio ITP site: rapamycin plus acarbose from 9 months gave male mice a longer lifespan than rapamycin alone in earlier cohorts. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 10
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Vivian Diaz.
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- Adam B. Salmon 2 shared studies Biologist of aging at UT Health San Antonio whose work in this Atlas spans rapamycin in mice and in common marmosets. He is a co-author on the Interventions Testing Program reports from the San Antonio site and on the marmoset rapamycin studies on blood markers, epigenetic age and the salivary gland
- Arlan Richardson Studies how rapamycin slows ageing in mice, including the broad changes it causes in the liver, and co-authored early studies showing that rapamycin protects memory in Alzheimer's-model mice
- David E. Harrison Led the Jackson Laboratory site of the NIA Interventions Testing Program. His 2009 Nature paper showed that rapamycin extends the lifespan of genetically diverse mice even when feeding starts at 20 months of age, which the authors described as the first pharmacological extension of lifespan in both sexes of a mammal
- Elizabeth Fernandez Aging researcher at the Barshop Institute in San Antonio who has worked on rapamycin studies in mice and common marmosets, including the NIA Interventions Testing Program
- James F. Nelson Physiologist of aging at UT Health San Antonio who studies how calorie restriction, sex hormones and drugs change mouse lifespan, and a co-investigator on the Interventions Testing Program
- Martin A. Javors Pharmacologist and professor at UT Health San Antonio who directs an analytical laboratory for biochemical and drug measurements, and a co-author of rapamycin studies in mice and in older people
- Matt Kaeberlein Extended TOR/aging research from yeast to mice to pet dogs
- Randy Strong Leads the San Antonio site of the NIA Interventions Testing Program, which tests each compound in parallel at three sites under one shared protocol. He first-authored the program's reports on resveratrol and other supplements (2012) and on rapamycin combined with acarbose (2022)
- Richard A. Miller Leads the University of Michigan site of the NIA Interventions Testing Program. His papers showed that rapamycin extends mouse lifespan when started in middle age, and that the size of the benefit depends on dose and differs between males and females
- Wilson C. Fok Biologist of aging who, in Viviana Pérez's group in San Antonio, compared rapamycin with dietary restriction in mouse liver and showed that rapamycin's lifespan gain comes with large changes in liver gene activity
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