Project description:Aside from the perinatal complications associated with low birth weight, individuals born with intra-uterine growth restriction suffer from chronic diseases late in life that ultimately lead to a shortened lifespan. These late life metabolic sequelae of low birth weight include obesity and metabolic syndrome, diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, stroke, dyslipidemia, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease/steatohepatitis. Animal models employing perinatal calorie restriction recapitulate the observations made in humans. Interestingly, if continued calorie restriction is employed post-natally the late life sequelae of intra-uterine growth restriction are ameliorated. These observations linking both fetal and early post natal growth to later health is now termed the developmental origins of health and disease. To further our understanding of the mechanism of how early growth affects late life health we have employed Affymetrix microarray-based expression profiling to characterize hepatic gene expression in a rat model of maternal semi-nutrient restriction. In these experiments we have limited maternal calorie intake to 50% of normal so as to create 3 groups of animals: Control (Con) male offspring born to mothers who were fed normally throughout gestation and lactation; intra-uterine calorie restricted male offspring (IUCR) born to mothers who had 50% restriction of calories from e11 to e21; and combined intra-uterine and post-natal calorie restriction (IPCR) male offspring who were born to mothers who received calorie restriction during both fetal growth (e11 to e21) and post-natally (p1-p21). Livers were collected at p21(day 21 of life) for Con and IPCR groups (IUCR withheld owing to ‘catch up” growth), and at p450 (day 450 of life) for Con, IUCR, and IPCR. The profiling data reveals clear alteration of circadian cycling at P21, and subtle changes for circadian gene expression at p450. In addition, a clear transcriptional response is found during active calorie restriction at p21 but an absence of a transcriptional response late in life at p450. Transcritional studies have been performed using Affymetrix Rat Gene 1.0 arrays for the following treatment groups, with each group run in triplicate (each replicate from separate littermates): Day 21 Control, Day 21 IPCR, Day 450 Con, Day 450 IUCR, Day 450 IPCR

Project description:Introduction: Early life is characterized by heightened susceptibility to infections and is recognized as a major determinant of the immune system development and the overall health for the entire human lifespan. However, our knowledge of the development of the neonatal immune system is incomplete, limiting the development of novel preventative and therapeutic strategies, especially in newborns. To gain insight into the early immune system development and plasma proteome ontogeny, the Expanded Program on Immunization Consortium (EPIC) led by Professor Ofer Levy MD at Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School and Tobias R. Kollmann Telethon Kids Institute, Australia as part of the Human Immunological Project Consortium (HIPC), established two independent cohorts of plasma from healthy newborns born by vaginal delivery during the first week of life. Methods: Blood samples were collected from 30 newborns in The Gambia (Medical Research Council Unit, The Gambia) at the day of birth (day of life, DOL 0) and at one of the follow-up visits on DOL1, DOL3, or DOL7. A similar validation cohort was collected in Papua New Guinea (PNG) (Institute for Medical Research, Papua New Guinea, Australasian) from 19 newborns. The plasma proteome was characterized by LC-MS on a Q Exactive using the proven and published plasma proteomics platform developed in the Steen Laboratory, led by Dr Hanno Steen, Director of Proteomics at Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, employing only microliter of plasma prepared in a 96-well plate format. The data was analyzed with MaxQuant. Results: We characterized 385 blood-plasma proteins. Utilizing the paired study design, we identified consistent changes related to ontogeny and cellular growth pathways in the blood-plasma proteome. Conclusion: This dataset allows for studying the early ontogeny of the plasma proteome, and in extension the early immune system development, in two independent healthy cohorts. Characterization of the plasma proteome may provide novel insight into new approaches to prevent, detect, and treat infectious diseases. Acknowledgements: We would like to thank all the participating families and all past and current members of the EPIC-HIPC, and the Steen Laboratory, without whom this study would not be possible. A special recognition goes to the teams who established the unique cohorts in The Gambia, by Professor Beate Kampmann and Dr Olubukola T. Idoko at The Gambia at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, The Gambia, and in PNG, by Anita H.J. van der Biggelaar and William S. Pomat at Wesfarmers Centre of Vaccines and Infectious Diseases, Telethon Kids Institute, University of Western Australia Perth, Australia.

Project description:Objective: Procyanidins are polyphenolic bioactive compounds that exert beneficial effects against obesity and its related diseases. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the supplementation with low doses of a grape seed procyanidin extract (GSPE) to dams during pre and postnatal periods has biological effects on their offspring at youth. Design: The metabolic imprinting effect of GSPE was evaluated in 30 days-old male offspring of four groups of rats that were fed either a standard diet (STD) or a high-fat diet (HFD) and supplemented with either GSPE at 25 mg per kg of body weight/day or vehicle during pregnancy and lactation. Results: A significant increase in the adiposity index and in the weight of all the white adipose tissue depots studied (retroperitoneal â??RWAT-, mesenteric â??MWAT-, epididymal â??EWAT- and inguinal â??IWAT-) was observed in offspring of dams fed with a HFD and treated with GSPE (HFT group), compared to the offspring of dams fed with the same diet and that do not received procyanidins (HF group). HFT animals also showed a higher number of cells in the EWAT, a sharply decrease of the circulating levels of monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) as well as a moderate, but significant, decrease of plasma glycerol levels. The transcriptomic analysis performed in the EWAT showed 238 genes differentially expressed between HF and HFT animals, covering an entire range of processes related with the immune function and the inflammatory response (the metabolic pathway mainly reflected in the EWAT), adipose tissue remodeling and function, lipid and glucose homeostasis and metabolism of methyl groups. Conclusion: GSPE treatment to dams fed a HFD during pregnancy and lactation increases adiposity, decreases the circulating levels of MCP-1 and modulates the expression of key genes involved in the adipose tissue metabolism of their offspring. The microarray study was performed with the EWAT RNA samples of rats from the HF and the HFT groups (n=8 animals each).

Project description:Slimming is globally prevalent especially in young women, and it may contribute to the metabolic health of their offspring. Whereas some Lamarckian ideas about environmental inheritance have been dismissed, increasing evidence suggest that certain acquired traits can be transmitted to the next generation. It is therefore of great interest to determine how and to what extent a maternal lifestyle change contributes to their offspring. Here we show that enriched environment (EE) induced maternal slimming improves general health and reprograms metabolic gene expression in mice offspring. EE in mothers induced decreased body weight, adiposity, and improved glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity. Relative to controls, their offspring exhibited improved general health such as reduced fat accumulation, enhanced metabolic parameters as well as glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity. Maternal slimming altered the expression of 1,732 genes in the liver of offspring, with coherent downregulation of genes involved in lipid and cholesterol biosynthesis. Epigenomic profiling in offspring revealed numerous changes in cytosine methylation depending on maternal slimming, including hypermethylation of several genes involved in lipid biosynthesis, correlated with the downregulation of these genes. Maternal slimming also altered overall transcriptome patterns in mature oocytes, which contributes largely to the metabolic health and gene expression patterns in offspring. Overall, our studies suggest that maternal slimming have a beneficial role in regulating metabolic profiles in offspring, implying that it might be considered as a potential strategy to reverse the global prevalence of obesity and related metabolic syndromes. Female F0 founders were raised on a standard diet in a normal cage until 12 weeks of age, at which point they were placed into the enriched environmental cage or stayed in the normal cage (chosen at random) for 4 weeks. Males were always raised on a standard diet in the standard cage. At 16 weeks, female F0 founders were mated with males in standard conditions. After 1 or 2 days, males were removed, and pregnant females were left alone with a standard diet in the standard cage until their litters were 3 weeks of age. Note that we always used virgin males to avoid confounding effects brought about by the males. Moreover, males mated with two female groups did not differ in phenotypic data (body weight, adiposity, fasting blood glucose and insulin levels). At 3 weeks of age, partial offspring were sacrificed and the median lobe of liver was rapidly dissected out and flash-frozen in liquid N2, each from an independent mother. Samples from five control and four slimming offspring, each from different mothers, were chosen for microarray analysis.

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Comparison of neonatal and adult lung gene expression

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