PressTV... Research has found that a woman’s diet at the time she becomes pregnant can affect the child’s genes.
The study’s lead scientist, Dr Branwen Hennig, from the Medical Research Council’s Gambia unit and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said, “Our results represent the first demonstration in humans that a mother’s nutritional well-being at the time of conception can change how her child’s genes will be interpreted, with a lifelong impact.”
The study took as subjects women in rural Gambia, where diet varies markedly from the rainy season to the dry one.
Eighty-four of the subjects had conceived at the peak of the rainy season, and about the same number had become pregnant at the peak of the dry season. Nutrient levels were measured in blood samples taken from the women, and after they gave birth, the DNA of their babies at two to eight months old was analyzed.
Genes can be subjected to the process of “silencing,” performed by tagging specific regions of DNA with chemical compounds called methyl groups. The addition of these compounds requires certain nutrients, including folate, vitamins B2, B6, and B12, choline, and methionine.
Co-author Andrew Prentice, professor of international nutrition at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: “Our ongoing research is yielding strong indications that the methylation machinery can be disrupted by nutrient deficiencies and that this can lead to disease.
“Our ultimate goal is to define an optimal diet for mothers-to-be that would prevent defects in the methylation process.”
HN/HN