Telomere dynamics and lifespan
From the bivariate model, we found individual variation in RTL, the rate of RTL change, and lifespan. We also found tendencies for RTL and the rate of RTL change to positively covary with lifespan (\(\sigma\) = 0.04 and 0.02 respectively), but the estimates were small and did not reach statistical significance, as their 95% credible intervals overlapped zero (Table 5).