Pregnant women's cognitive appraisal of a natural disaster affects DNA methylation in their children 13 years later: Project Ice Storm.

ABSTRACT: Prenatal maternal stress (PNMS) can impact a variety of outcomes in the offspring throughout childhood and persisting into adulthood as shown in human and animal studies. Many of the effects of PNMS on offspring outcomes likely reflect the effects of epigenetic changes, such as DNA methylation, to the fetal genome. However, no animal or human research can determine the extent to which the effects of PNMS on DNA methylation in human offspring is the result of the objective severity of the stressor to the pregnant mother, or her negative appraisal of the stressor or her resulting degree of negative stress. We examined the genome-wide DNA methylation profile in T cells from 34 adolescents whose mothers had rated the 1998 Québec ice storm's consequences as positive or negative (that is, cognit

SUBMITTER: Cao-Lei L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4445750 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature