Fetal Growth as a Cue of Matrilineal Nutritional History in the Philippines

胎儿生长是菲律宾母系营养史的线索

• 批准号: 0746320
• 负责人: Christopher Kuzawa
• 金额: $ 24.54万
• 依托单位: Northwestern University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2008-06-15 至 2011-11-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0746320&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Fetal; Growth; Cue; Matrilineal; Nutritional

The nutrition that a fetus receives from the mother across the placenta influences not only its rate of growth but also that individual's adult biology, including reproductive function, body size and risk of developing chronic diseases like high blood pressure, diabetes or heart disease. As more studies demonstrate such long-term effects of intrauterine conditions, this has led to new questions about their function. It has been proposed that these developmental adjustments represent a form of adaptation in which maternal biology sends cues across the placenta that allow the fetus to adjust its metabolism and biology in anticipation of nutrition and other conditions in the postnatal environment. This idea of intergenerational signaling has been demonstrated in other species, but most are short-lived. How such a system might operate in a long-lived species like humans is less clear, because the mother's diet or health during the months of pregnancy may be less representative of typical conditions over the many years or decades that a human offspring will live in that ecology. To clarify the role of fetal nutrition as an ecological nutritional cue, this study will test whether a woman's developmental history of nutrition and growth predict the fetal growth rate of her offspring. This US and Filipino team of researchers will work with a study that originally enrolled 3000+ pregnant women in 1983 and has since collected detailed information on the growth, nutrition, and other characteristics of their offspring as they aged. The original offspring are now reproductive-aged adults having offspring of their own (age 25-26 years), allowing this team to evaluate the intergenerational predictors of fetal nutrition and growth rate using data spanning 3 matrilineal generations. All women (the original female offspring n~900) will be tracked to identify new pregnancies, and information on diet, health and nutritional status will be collected during pregnancy and in their newborns at birth. This will replicate data collected in their mothers when they were infants, and allow identification of which factors in the mother's nutritional history, extending back to the grandmother's pregnancy nutritional status, predict fetal growth rate in their offspring. In addition, birth records will be used to reconstruct birth weight of prior offspring of these women, but also of the spouses of study males, which will provide insights into the relative importance of genetic and developmental factors as influences on fetal growth rate.This study will clarify what information from the mother's nutritional history might be encoded in fetal nutrition and reflected in fetal growth rate. This will help explain the role of fetal developmental plasticity as a mechanism of biological adaptation in humans and will shed light on how these systems might influence later health. By clarifying the ages and types of nutritional and other factors in the mother's developmental past that predict offspring fetal growth rate, this study could also lead to new approaches to maternal nutritional supplementation aimed at improving birth outcomes.

胎儿通过胎盘从母亲那里获得的营养不仅影响其生长速度，还影响个体的成年生物学，包括生殖功能、体型以及患高血压、糖尿病或心脏病等慢性疾病的风险。随着越来越多的研究证明宫内条件的长期影响，这引发了有关其功能的新问题。有人提出，这些发育调整代表了一种适应形式，其中母体生物学通过胎盘发送信号，使胎儿能够根据出生后环境中的营养和其他条件调整其新陈代谢和生物学。这种代际信号传递的想法已在其他物种中得到证实，但大多数都是短暂的。这样的系统如何在像人类这样的长寿物种中运作尚不清楚，因为母亲在怀孕期间的饮食或健康状况可能不太能代表人类后代在该生态中生活的许多年或几十年的典型条件。为了阐明胎儿营养作为生态营养线索的作用，本研究将测试女性的营养和生长发育史是否可以预测其后代的胎儿生长速度。这个由美国和菲律宾研究人员组成的团队将开展一项研究，该研究最初于 1983 年招募了 3000 多名孕妇，此后收集了有关其后代随着年龄增长的生长、营养和其他特征的详细信息。最初的后代现在是育龄成年人，拥有自己的后代（年龄 25-26 岁），这使得该团队能够使用跨越 3 个母系世代的数据来评估胎儿营养和生长速度的代际预测因子。所有女性（最初的女性后代n~900）都将被跟踪，以识别新的怀孕情况，并收集怀孕期间和新生儿出生时的饮食、健康和营养状况信息。这将复制婴儿时期母亲收集的数据，并能够识别母亲营养史中的哪些因素，追溯到祖母的怀孕营养状况，预测后代的胎儿生长速度。此外，出生记录将用于重建这些女性先前后代的出生体重，以及研究男性配偶的出生体重，这将深入了解遗传和发育因素对胎儿生长速度影响的相对重要性。这项研究将阐明来自母亲营养史的哪些信息可能被编码在胎儿营养中并反映在胎儿生长速度中。这将有助于解释胎儿发育可塑性作为人类生物适应机制的作用，并将揭示这些系统如何影响以后的健康。通过阐明母亲过去发育过程中的年龄、营养类型以及其他可预测后代胎儿生长速度的因素，这项研究还可能带来旨在改善出生结果的母亲营养补充的新方法。