Maternal consumption of a Western-style food regimen alters the transcriptional panorama of fetal blood stem cells in rhesus macaques, researchers report November 3rd within the journal Stem Cell Experiences.
“This discovery is the primary demonstration in primates that maternal unhealthy food regimen and weight problems disrupt the immune system within the growing fetus,” says Oleg Varlamov of the Oregon Nationwide Primate Analysis Middle. “The principle implication of this examine is that maternal weight problems might affect the event of the fetal bone marrow and fetal immune system.”
Pre-pregnancy weight problems is related to an elevated danger of an infection and aberrant inflammatory responses within the offspring, however the underlying mechanisms stay largely unknown. Particularly, little or no is thought concerning the impact of a Western-style food regimen on fetal hematopoiesis — the formation of blood mobile elements — in animal fashions that resemble human improvement.
Throughout late improvement, the fetal bone marrow turns into the main website the place immune cells known as macrophages and B-lymphocytes are produced by way of differentiation of hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs). Within the new examine, Varlamov and his collaborators analyzed the transcriptional panorama of fetal bone marrow HSPCs at single-cell decision in fetal macaques uncovered to a maternal high-fat, Western-style food regimen or a low-fat management food regimen.
“We have been motivated to analyze how maternal weight problems impacts the fetal immune system throughout being pregnant in nonhuman primates, representing essentially the most related animal mannequin for finding out human improvement,” Varlamov says.
The outcomes demonstrated {that a} Western-style food regimen induced a hyperinflammatory response in HSPCs and fetal macrophages and suppressed the expression of B-cell improvement genes. Furthermore, the unhealthy food regimen led to poor engraftment of fetal HSPCs in immunodeficient mice.
“Maternal weight problems drastically impacted the power of fetal blood stem cells to provide B-lymphocytes — immune cells that make antibodies in response to an infection — and made fetal blood stem cells extra infected,” Varlamov says.
Research limitations included the small pattern dimension, which could restrict the power to detect weaker results of maternal food regimen on fetal outcomes. As well as, the researchers did not discover the results of maternal weight problems on postnatal improvement and solely centered on prenatal improvement. Additional research are additionally wanted to check whether or not maternal weight problems disrupts offspring responses to an infection and irritation.
“This examine units the stage for understanding the hyperlink between maternal weight problems, prenatal vitamin, and illnesses involving immune progeny of the HSPC compartment in youngsters and highlights the necessity to higher perceive the susceptibility of the growing hematopoietic system to metabolic dysregulation over the lifetime,” Varlamov says.
This examine was supported by the Nationwide Institutes of Well being.
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