Associations Between Fetal Imprinted Genes and Maternal Blood Pressure in Pregnancy.

In addition to maternal genes and environmental exposures, variation in fetal imprinted genes could also affect maternal blood pressure during pregnancy. Our objective was to test the associations between polymorphic variants in 16 imprinted genes and maternal mean arterial blood pressures in 1160 DNA trios from 2 established birth cohorts (the Cambridge Baby Growth and Wellbeing Studies) and seek replication in 1367 Hyperglycemia and Adverse Pregnancy Outcome Study participants. Significant univariate associations, all independent of fetal sex, were observed in the Cambridge cohorts, including FAM99A rs1489945 transmitted from the mother (P=2×10), DLK1 rs10139403 (mother; P=9×10), DLK1 rs12147008 (mother; P=1×10), H19 rs217222 (father; P=1×10), SNRPN rs1453556 (father; P=1×10), IGF2 rs6356 (father; P=1×10), and NNAT rs6066671 (father; P=1×10).