Assessment of ten trace elements in umbilical cord blood and maternal blood: association with birth weight.

Background: Trace elements are an essential nutritional component for humans and inadequate tissue-concentrations may have a significant effect on fetal size.

Objective: To measure ten trace elements in blood samples from mothers and their newborns, and assess their association with anthropometric characteristics at birth. The effects of other factors on fetal growth, such as biologic characteristics of the infant and mother, were analysed.

DNA methylation patterns in newborns exposed to tobacco in utero.

Background: Maternal smoking during pregnancy is a major risk factor for adverse health outcomes. The main objective of the study was to assess the impact of in utero tobacco exposure on DNA methylation in children born at term with appropriate weight at birth.

Methods: Twenty mother-newborn dyads, after uncomplicated pregnancies, in the absence of perinatal illness were included.

Associations of birth weight and postnatal weight gain with cardiometabolic risk parameters at 5 years of age.

The present prospective study assessed the impact of birth weight (BW) and postnatal weight gain on blood pressure and metabolic profile during the first 5 years of life. One hundred thirty-nine newborns (63 women) born at term after uncomplicated pregnancies and in the absence of perinatal illness were included. Subjects were divided according to size at birth in small, appropriate, and large for gestational age.

High cotinine levels are persistent during the first days of life in newborn second hand smokers.

Background: Despite the adverse effects of maternal smoking during pregnancy on the newborn's health are well-known, in the pediatric population, a high prevalence exists that is very much affected by second hand smoke (SHS). This study aims to investigate the impact of maternal smoking habits during pregnancy on cotinine levels in newborns during the first days of life. The high association between cotinine concentration in maternal and umbilical cord blood (UCB) has been previously reported, but the levels of blood cotinine that remain in infants born to smokers is unknown.

Metabolomic profiling in blood from umbilical cords of low birth weight newborns.

Background: Low birth weight has been linked to an increased risk to develop obesity, type 2 diabetes, and hypertension in adult life, although the mechanisms underlying the association are not well understood. The objective was to determine whether the metabolomic profile of plasma from umbilical cord differs between low and normal birth weight newborns.

Methods: Fifty healthy pregnant women and their infants were selected.

Blood pressure and obesity exert independent influences on pulse wave velocity in youth.

The objective was to analyze pulse wave velocity (PWV) in normotensive, high-normal, and hypertensive youths by using aortic-derived parameters from peripheral recordings. The impact of obesity on vascular phenotypes was also analyzed. A total of 501 whites from 8 to 18 years of age were included.

Birth weight and characteristics of endothelial and smooth muscle cell cultures from human umbilical cord vessels.

Background: Low birth weight has been related to an increased risk for developing high blood pressure in adult life. The molecular and cellular analysis of umbilical cord artery and vein may provide information about the early vascular characteristics of an individual. We have assessed several phenotype characteristics of the four vascular cell types derived from human umbilical cords of newborns with different birth weight.

Procedure to consistently obtain endothelial and smooth muscle cell cultures from umbilical cord vessels.

The prenatal history of an individual can be responsible to some extent for the occurrence of several diseases later in life. Thus, low birth weight has been related to an increased risk of developing hypertension or type 2 diabetes. The molecular and cellular basis of this increased risk could be found in body fluids and cell types that can be obtained just after birth.

First-year blood pressure increase steepest in low birthweight newborns.

Aim: The present research has been undertaken prospectively to study the impact of birthweight and growth pattern on blood pressure changes from birth through the first year of life.

Methods: Parents of newborns born at term (gestational age > 37 weeks) after uncomplicated pregnancies and in the absence of perinatal illness were randomly invited to allow their children to participate in the study. One hundred and forty-nine (84 male and 65 female) newborns were included in the present analysis.