Association between trimester-specific prenatal air pollution exposure and placental weight of twins.

Introduction: This study investigates the association between maternal exposure to particulate matter (PM) and nitric dioxide (NO) during the first, second and third trimester and placental weight and birth weight/placental weight (BW/PW) ratio in twins at birth.

Methods: Cross-sectional data of 3340 twins from the East Flanders Prospective Twin Survey was used. Air pollutant exposure was estimated via spatial temporal interpolation.

Placental telomere length decreases with gestational age and is influenced by parity: a study of third trimester live-born twins.

Background: In contrast to the postnatal period, little is known about telomere length (TL) during prenatal life. The decrease in placental TL remains unknown, although intra uterine growth retardation and preeclampsia are associated with shorter placental TL. The aim of this study is to assess the decrease of placental TL during the third trimester of gestation and to explore the role of potential "growth influencing factors".

Association between polyunsaturated fatty acid concentrations in maternal plasma phospholipids during pregnancy and offspring adiposity at age 7: the MEFAB cohort.

Prenatal polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) concentrations may be involved in the prenatal programming of adiposity. In this study we therefore explored the association between maternal PUFA concentrations, measured up to four times during pregnancy, and offspring adiposity at age 7 in 234 mother-child pairs of the Maastricht Essential Fatty Acid Birth cohort. Only dihomo-gamma-linolenic acid (DGLA, an n-6 fatty acid) concentration was associated with adiposity: per standard deviation increase in relative DGLA concentration, BMI increased by 0.