Presenter: Kent Thornburg, PhD

Original Date: February 13, 2016

The prevalence of type 2 diabetes and heart disease is on the rise in the USA. It has long been known that chronic disease risk in adults is inversely related to their birthweight. However, there is increasing evidence that maternal diet, maternal body type and placental size and shape are powerful predictors of adult-onset disease. The biological mechanisms by which these factors lead to disease risk are not fully understood but it is becoming clear that maternal diet effects are trans-generational and transmitted through epigenetic modification of DNA and histone tails. Accumulating epidemiological evidence shows that the nutrition levels of women before and during pregnancy influence the growth of offspring over the first 1000 days after the conception and even into childhood.

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