Diet of Mother Can Lead to Alterations in

Her Childs DNA

April 30, 2014 | by Justine Alford
A new study, published in Nature Communications, has found that maternal diet around the
time of conception can influence certain properties of the childs DNA. This could have
lifelong implications.
The researchers that conducted this study weren't looking at the actual DNA sequences of the
children; they wanted to see whether the diet of the mother was capable of causing epigenetic
changes. Epigenetics refers to changes in gene expression that occur without alterations in the
DNA sequence itself.
One example of epigenetic modification is DNA methylation, which involves the addition of
methyl groups to certain bits of DNA. Methyl groups can be obtained from the diet by eating
certain foods, for example those containing choline or particular vitamins such as B6 and
B12.
It was demonstrated previously that maternal diet prior to conception can induce epigenetic
changes in the offspring of mice, but the same had not been investigated in humans prior to
this study.
Scientists chose to study pregnant women in rural Gambia because populations here are
dependent on foods that they have grown themselves and therefore their diets are different
between the dry and rainy seasons. 84 women that conceived at the peak of the rainy season
and 83 women that conceived at the peak of the dry season participated in the study.
The team took blood samples from the mothers in order to compare differences in nutrition;
in particular they wanted to look at the levels of substances that can donate methyl groups,
and therefore possibly influence DNA methylation. When they later investigated the DNA of
the children they found that those conceived during the rainy season had higher rates of
methylation in all of the genes studied when compared with those conceived during the dry
season. They found that these changes were associated with maternal nutrient levels; in
particular two amino acids called cysteine and homocysteine. They also found that increased
maternal body mass index was associated with lower rates of infant DNA methylation.
Its important to note that while associations were made between maternal diet and infant
DNA methylation, this study did not investigate the consequences that this may have on the
children. Although this initial study involved a small number of participants, the team believe
that the data is important and hope to progress the work with larger, more in-depth studies.
Read more at http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/diet-mother-can-leadalterations-her-child%E2%80%99s-dna#cUxj1UcxTu86SfUe.99