Do you need variables you understand? What about principal component or factor analysis?
Neither Principal Components nor Factor Analysis would be appropriate in a regression situation (even though you can certainly read about using those techniques for regression in the literature). It is more logical to use (here we go again) PLS, which creates vectors of independent variables that are designed to be highly predictive of the dependent variable. PCA and FA create vectors with no regard to the relationship to the dependent variable.
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