Intergenerational effect of weight gain in childhood on offspring birthweight.

Background: Some studies suggest that weight gain in childhood may increase the risk of chronic diseases in adulthood, and recent studies have noticed that the timing of weight gain may be related to its long-term consequence. However, weight gain in childhood has clear short-term benefits, and the literature on the pro and cons of weight gain in childhood is limited.

Methods: In 1982, all 5914 hospital births (over 99% of all deliveries) occurring in Pelotas, Southern Brazil, were identified and studied prospectively on several occasions.

Pre-eclampsia is associated with increased risk of stroke in the adult offspring: the Helsinki birth cohort study.

Background And Purpose: Women who develop pre-eclampsia in pregnancy are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease. The offspring from pregnancies complicated by pre-eclampsia have higher blood pressures during childhood, but little is known about their long-term health. We hypothesized that pre-eclampsia would lead to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease in the offspring.

Role of childhood growth on the risk of metabolic syndrome in obese men and women.

Aim: Although obesity is the key characteristic of the metabolic syndrome, not all obese individuals develop the syndrome. Our aim was to identify characteristics of early growth that protect these individuals from the metabolic syndrome.

Methods: We examined 2003 subjects born in Helsinki, Finland, between 1934 and 1944.

Childhood growth and future risk of the metabolic syndrome in normal-weight men and women.

Aim: The aim of this study was to examine the effects of early growth on the risk of developing the metabolic syndrome in normal-weight individuals.

Methods: We examined 2003 subjects born in Helsinki, Finland, between 1934 and 1944, focusing on 588 individuals who were normal weight (body mass index [BMI] less than or equal to 25 kg/m(2)). These subjects had a median of seven measurements of height and weight from birth to 2 years, and eight measurements from 2 to 11 years of age.

Interaction between prenatal growth and high-risk genotypes in the development of type 2 diabetes.

Aims/hypothesis: Early environmental factors and genetic variants have been reported to be involved in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes. The aim of this study was to investigate whether there is an interaction between birthweight and common variants in the TCF7L2, HHEX, PPARG, KCNJ11, SLC30A8, IGF2BP2, CDKAL1, CDKN2A/2B and JAZF1 genes in the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Methods: A total of 2,003 participants from the Helsinki Birth Cohort Study, 311 of whom were diagnosed with type 2 diabetes by an OGTT, were genotyped for the specified variants.

Impact of glucose metabolism and birth size on cognitive performance in elderly subjects.

Aims: We aimed to investigate the impact of diabetes and impaired glucose tolerance on cognitive performance and to explore the association between birth weight and cognitive performance among diabetic subjects.

Methods: We performed a standard oral glucose tolerance test and a computerised test for assessment of cognitive performance (CogState) in 1243 subjects; 173 of them had type 2 diabetes. At the time of cognitive testing the mean age of the subjects was 64 years.

The association of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity and blood pressure in an Afro-Caribbean population.

Hyperactivity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPAA) resulting from fetal programming may play a role in the development of high blood pressure (BP) in black people. We assessed the diurnal salivary cortisol profile in children with and without increased BP and evaluated their mother's HPAA. In a cross-sectional study, 20 Afro-Caribbean children (mean age 9.

Birth weight and risk of type 2 diabetes: a systematic review.

Context: Low birth weight is implicated as a risk factor for type 2 diabetes. However, the strength, consistency, independence, and shape of the association have not been systematically examined.

Objective: To conduct a quantitative systematic review examining published evidence on the association of birth weight and type 2 diabetes in adults.

Duration of breast-feeding and adiposity in adult life.

Few studies have examined whether the duration of breast-feeding is associated with BMI in adult life. In the past, the heights and weights of infants and the duration of breast-feeding were routinely recorded at infant welfare clinics in Helsinki, Finland. Most infants in the city were taken to these free clinics.

De novo synthesis and degradation of Lx and V cycle pigments during shade and sun acclimation in avocado leaves.

The photoprotective role of the universal violaxanthin cycle that interconverts violaxanthin (V), antheraxanthin (A), and zeaxanthin (Z) is well established, but functions of the analogous conversions of lutein-5,6-epoxide (Lx) and lutein (L) in the selectively occurring Lx cycle are still unclear. We investigated carotenoid pools in Lx-rich leaves of avocado (Persea americana) during sun or shade acclimation at different developmental stages. During sun exposure of mature shade leaves, an unusual decrease in L preceded the deepoxidation of Lx to L and of V to A+Z.

Predicting adult metabolic syndrome from childhood body mass index: follow-up of the New Delhi birth cohort.

Objectives: To assess whether serial measurements of childhood body mass index (BMI) give clinically useful predictions of the risk of developing adult metabolic syndrome and impaired glucose tolerance or type 2 diabetes.

Design/setting: Follow-up of a community-based birth cohort in Delhi, India.

Participants: 1492 men and women aged 26-32 years whose BMI was recorded 6-monthly throughout childhood.

Adult metabolic syndrome and impaired glucose tolerance are associated with different patterns of BMI gain during infancy: Data from the New Delhi Birth Cohort.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to describe patterns of infant, childhood, and adolescent BMI and weight associated with adult metabolic risk factors for cardiovascular disease.

Research Design And Methods: We measured waist circumference, blood pressure, glucose, insulin and lipid concentrations, and the prevalence of metabolic syndrome (National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III definition) in 1,492 men and women aged 26-32 years in Delhi, India, whose weight and height were recorded every 6 months throughout infancy (0-2 years), childhood (2-11 years), and adolescence (11 years-adult).

Results: Men and women with metabolic syndrome (29% overall), any of its component features, or higher (greater than upper quartile) insulin resistance (homeostasis model assessment) had more rapid BMI or weight gain than the rest of the cohort throughout infancy, childhood, and adolescence.

Appetite regulatory mechanisms and food intake in mice are sensitive to mismatch in diets between pregnancy and postnatal periods.

Human and animal studies suggest that obesity in adulthood may have its origins partly during prenatal development. One of the underlying causes of obesity is the perturbation of hypothalamic mechanisms controlling appetite. We determined mRNA levels of genes that regulate appetite, namely neuropeptide Y (NPY), pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) and the leptin receptor isoform Ob-Rb, in the hypothalamus of adult mouse offspring from pregnant dams fed a protein-restricted diet, and examined whether mismatched post-weaning high-fat diet altered further expression of these gene transcripts.

Cardiovascular health of Finnish war evacuees 60 years later.

Background: Early life experiences might have long-term effects on health.

Aim: To assess prevalence of cardiovascular disease and diabetes in later life among individuals exposed to traumatic separation in early childhood due to World War II.

Methods: Of the participants of the Helsinki Birth Cohort 1934-44 Study (n=2003), 320 had been evacuated abroad to temporary foster care in childhood.

Transgenerational effects of prenatal exposure to the Dutch famine on neonatal adiposity and health in later life.

Objective: Maternal undernutrition during gestation is associated with increased metabolic and cardiovascular disease in the offspring. We investigated whether these effects may persist in subsequent generations.

Design: Historical cohort study.

Increased reproductive success of women after prenatal undernutrition.

Background: Prenatal exposure to the Dutch famine is associated with an increased risk of chronic degenerative disease. We now investigate whether prenatal famine exposure affected reproductive success.

Methods: We assessed reproductive success (number of children, number of twins, age at delivery, childlessness) of men and women born around the time of the Dutch famine of 1944-1945 in the Wilhelmina Gasthuis, Amsterdam, whose birth records have been kept.

Sex-specific programming of cardiovascular physiology in children.

Aims: Increasing evidence suggests that adverse prenatal environments, as indicated by low birth weight, cause long-term changes in cardiovascular physiology that predispose to circulatory disease. The mechanisms are poorly understood, most human studies have been carried out in adults and little is known about early pathophysiological changes. Therefore, we have assessed the relationship between birth weight and cardiovascular physiology in children.

Body size at birth and socio-economic status in childhood: implications for Cloninger's psychobiological model of temperament at age 60.

Small birth size predicts various psychiatric outcomes, including depression. While biologically based temperamental traits may constitute a vulnerability factor for depression, the extent to which birth size predicts these traits in adulthood is not known. We studied, in 1369 women and men identified from a cohort born in 1934-44 in Helsinki, Finland, whether birth size predicts the temperamental traits measured with Cloninger's Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire at an average age of 63 years.

Body mass index during childhood and adult body composition in men and women aged 56-70 y.

Background: The relation between the change in body mass index (BMI) through childhood and body composition in adult life is important because body composition is known to affect adult health.

Objective: The objective was to examine how the change in BMI throughout childhood is related to adult lean and fat mass.

Design: We examined how the change in BMI in childhood was related to adult body composition in 885 men and 1032 women born during 1934-1944, whose weights and heights during childhood were recorded serially.

A possible link between the pubertal growth of girls and ovarian cancer in their daughters.

At puberty, the distance between the iliac crests of the female pelvis, measured by the intercristal and interspinous diameters, increases rapidly. This is mainly controlled by estrogens. We have followed up 6,370 women who were born in Helsinki during 1934-1944, and whose mothers' pelvic bones were measured during routine antenatal care.

Infant growth and hostility in adult life.

Objective: Hostility may confer a risk of cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality, but why is uncertain. A common origin in suboptimal fetal and early postnatal life may lie beneath. This study tested whether prenatal and postnatal growth predicts hostility in adult life.

Low protein diet fed exclusively during mouse oocyte maturation leads to behavioural and cardiovascular abnormalities in offspring.

Early embryonic development is known to be susceptible to maternal undernutrition, leading to a disease-related postnatal phenotype. To determine whether this sensitivity extended into oocyte development, we examined the effect of maternal normal protein diet (18% casein; NPD) or isocaloric low protein diet (9% casein; LPD) restricted to one ovulatory cycle (3.5 days) prior to natural mating in female MF-1 mice.

Childhood growth and cardiovascular reactivity to psychological stressors in late adulthood.

Objective: Specific childhood growth patterns relate to risk of cardiovascular (CV) disease later in life, but the underlying mechanisms are unclear. We studied whether CV reactivity, a predictor of CV disease risk, is associated with childhood growth trajectories.

Methods: A total of 144 (77 women and 67 men) participants of the Helsinki Birth Cohort Study born 1934-1944, whose height and weight were recorded repeatedly during the first 11 years, underwent the Trier Social Stress Test at the average age of 63 years.

Vitamin D insufficiency is common in Indian mothers but is not associated with gestational diabetes or variation in newborn size.

Background/objectives: Vitamin D is required for bone growth and normal insulin secretion. Maternal hypovitaminosis D may impair fetal growth and increase the risk of gestational diabetes. We have related maternal vitamin D status in pregnancy to maternal and newborn glucose and insulin concentrations, and newborn size, in a South Indian population.

Growth before 2 years of age and serum lipids 60 years later: the Helsinki Birth Cohort study.

Background: Small body size at birth and slow growth during the first 2 years after birth, leading to low body mass index (BMI) at 2 years, are associated with coronary heart disease and stroke in adult life. We tested the hypothesis that this path of growth is associated with an atherogenic lipid profile in later life.

Methods: We measured serum lipid concentrations at age 57-70 years in 1999 members of the Helsinki Birth Cohort.