Associations between birth characteristics, pubertal timing and adult height.

Aim: This study investigated the association between gestational age and birth size with pubertal timing, measured as peak height velocity, and adult height.

Methods: This retrospective, population-based study was conducted in Sweden in 2023. A sub-group of the 1974 and 1990 GrowUp Gothenburg cohorts was used (n = 4700, 50% males).

Timing of menarche and pubertal growth patterns using the QEPS growth model.

Objectives: To explore the timing of menarche, postmenarcheal growth, and to investigate the impact of various variables on menarcheal age and postmenarcheal and pubertal growth.

Study Design: This longitudinal community population-based study analyzed pubertal growth and menarcheal age in 793 healthy term-born Swedish girls, a subset of the GrowUpGothenburg cohort. The timing of menarche and postmenarcheal growth was related to variables from the Quadratic-Exponential-Pubertal-Stop (QEPS) growth model, birth characteristics, and parental height.

Mapping robust multiscale communities in chromosome contact networks.

To better understand DNA's 3D folding in cell nuclei, researchers developed chromosome capture methods such as Hi-C that measure the contact frequencies between all DNA segment pairs across the genome. As Hi-C data sets often are massive, it is common to use bioinformatics methods to group DNA segments into 3D regions with correlated contact patterns, such as Topologically associated domains and A/B compartments. Recently, another research direction emerged that treats the Hi-C data as a network of 3D contacts.

Swedish Child Health Services Register: a quality register for child health services and children's well-being.

Background: Swedish child health services (CHS) is a free-of-charge healthcare system that reaches almost all children under the age of 6. The aim for the CHS is to improve children's physical, psychological and social health by promoting health and development, preventing illness and detecting emerging problems early in the child's life. The services are defined in a national programme divided into three parts: universal interventions, targeted interventions and indicated interventions.

Increased incidence of overweight and obesity among preschool Swedish children during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has had wide effects on child health globally. Increased prevalence of childhood obesity has been observed by a number of countries during the pandemic. The absence of a formal societal lockdown during the pandemic, made Sweden stand out compared to other countries.

Energy Trade-off and 4 Extreme Human Body Types.

Background: Resource trade-off theory suggests that increased performance on a given trait comes at the cost of decreased performance on other traits.

Methods: Growth data from 1889 subjects (996 girls) were used from the GrowUp1974 Gothenburg study. Energy Trade-Off (ETO) between height and weight for individuals with extreme body types was characterized using a novel ETO-Score (ETOS).

Mapping nonlocal relationships between metadata and network structure with metadata-dependent encoding of random walks.

Integrating structural information and metadata, such as gender, social status, or interests, enriches networks and enables a better understanding of the large-scale structure of complex systems. However, existing approaches to augment networks with metadata for community detection only consider immediately adjacent nodes and cannot exploit the nonlocal relationships between metadata and large-scale network structure present in many spatial and social systems. Here, we develop a flow-based community detection framework based on the map equation that integrates network information and metadata of distant nodes and reveals more complex relationships.

Novel type of references for BMI aligned for onset of puberty - using the QEPS growth model.

Objectives: Despite inter-individual variations in pubertal timing, growth references are conventionally constructed relative to chronological age (C-age). Thus, they are based on reference populations containing a mix of prepubertal and pubertal individuals, making them of limited use for detecting abnormal growth during adolescence. Recently we developed new types of height and weight references, with growth aligned to age at onset of the pubertal growth spurt (P-age).

Novel type of references for weight aligned for onset of puberty - using the QEPS growth model.

Background: Growth references are traditionally constructed relative to chronological age, despite inter-individual variations in pubertal timing. A new type of height reference was recently developed allowing growth to be aligned based on onset of pubertal height growth. We here aim to develop a corresponding reference for pubertal weight.

Growth pattern evaluation of the Edinburgh and Gothenburg cohorts by QEPS height model.

Background: The QEPS-growth-model, developed and validated in GrowUp-Gothenburg cohorts, used for developing growth references and investigating healthy/pathological growth, lacks external validation from other longitudinal cohorts of healthy individuals.

Aim: To investigate if the QEPS-model can fit the longitudinal Edinburgh growth study of another design than GrowUp-Gothenburg cohorts, and to compare growth patterns in the individuals born in mid-1970s in North-Western Europe.

Methods: Longitudinal growth data were obtained from the Edinburgh and the GrowUp1974Gothenburg cohorts.

The Quadratic-Exponential-Pubertal-Stop model is valid for analysing human growth patterns and developing novel growth references.

Aim: Human growth patterns are important, especially in paediatrics and public health, and the aim of this review was to provide an overview of human growth, especially secular changes of growth and pubertal growth.

Methods: This review of human growth was mainly based on studies published during the 20th and early 21st centuries. Special attention was paid to secular changes, pubertal growth, Nordic growth studies and the contribution of the Quadratic-Exponential-Pubertal-Stop (QEPS) growth model for analysing growth patterns.

The pubertal growth spurt is diminished in children with severe obesity.

Background: At the population level, there is a negative linear correlation between childhood body mass index (BMI) and pubertal height gain. However, in children with obesity, there are no studies showing whether the severity of obesity affects pubertal height gain. Moreover, how obesity in childhood affects pubertal timing is controversial, especially in boys.

A new type of pubertal height reference based on growth aligned for onset of pubertal growth.

Objectives Growth references of today traditionally describe growth in relation to chronological age. Despite the broad variation in age of pubertal maturation, references related to biological age are lacking. To fill this knowledge gap, we aimed to develop a new type of pubertal height reference for improved growth evaluation during puberty, considering individual variation in pubertal timing.

Swedish references for weight, weight-for-height and body mass index: The GrowUp 1990 Gothenburg study.

Aim: To update the Swedish references for weight, weight-for-height and body mass index (BMI) considering the secular trend for height but not including that for weight.

Methods: Longitudinal measures of height and weight were obtained (0-18 years) from 1418 (698 girls) healthy children from the GrowUp 1990 Gothenburg cohort born at term to non-smoking mothers and Nordic parents. A total of 145 individuals with extreme BMI value vs GrowUp 1974 BMI SDS reference were excluded (0-2 years: ±4SDS, 2 < years: -3SDS, +2.

A new Swedish reference for total and prepubertal height.

Aim: We aimed to develop up-to-date references with standard deviation scores (SDS) for prepubertal and total height.

Methods: Longitudinal length/height measures from 1572 healthy children (51.5% boys) born at term in 1989-1991 to non-smoking mothers and Nordic parents were obtained from the GrowUp 1990 Gothenburg cohort.

Nordic populations are still getting taller - secular changes in height from the 20th to 21st century.

Aim: The study aims to investigate secular changes in adult height among Nordic reference populations during the last four decades and in parents of Swedish study participants, and to study during which growth phase(s) infancy, childhood or puberty changes in height and tempo occurred.

Methods: Length and height data were obtained from publications on populations used as current and previous national height references in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. Measurements from birth until adult height and original parental heights of participants in Swedish reference populations born 1956, 1974, and 1990 were used.

Estimating secular changes in longitudinal growth patterns underlying adult height with the QEPS model: the Grow Up Gothenburg cohorts.

Background: Over the past 150 years, humans have become taller, and puberty has begun earlier. It is unclear if these changes are continuing in Sweden, and how longitudinal growth patterns are involved. We aimed to evaluate the underlying changes in growth patterns from birth to adulthood by QEPS estimates in two Swedish cohorts born in 1974 and 1990.

Insight into human pubertal growth by applying the QEPS growth model.

Background: Computerized mathematical models describing absolute and relative individual growth during puberty in both cm and standard deviation (SD)-scores are lacking. The present study aimed to fill this gap, by applying the QEPS-model that delineates mathematically the specific pubertal functions of the total growth curve.

Methods: Study population used was the individual growth curves of the longitudinally followed cohort GrowUp1974 Gothenburg (n = 2280).

Pubertal height gain is inversely related to peak BMI in childhood.

Background: Childhood BMI may influence subsequent growth in height as well as the timing of puberty. The aim of the present study was to investigate associations between BMI in childhood and subsequent height gain/pubertal growth.

Methods: Longitudinal growth data were used (GrowUpGothenburg cohort, n = 1,901).

Modelling individual longitudinal human growth from fetal to adult life - QEPS I.

Background: Only one mathematical model to date describes human growth and its different phases from fetal life until adult height.

Aim: To develop a model describing growth from fetal life to adult height taking maturation/biological tempo into consideration.

Subjects: The model was developed based on longitudinal mean height values obtained from published growth references for a cohort of 3650 healthy Swedish children followed from birth circa 1974 until adult height combined with birth-length for circa 400 000 healthy infants born 1990-1995.