Maternal Lipid Concentrations during Early Pregnancy and Eating Behaviour and Energy Intake in the Offspring

Abstract

Worldwide, childhood obesity is rapidly increasing, making it a pressing public health issue. Obesity is strongly linked to eating behaviour and energy intake but little is known about their prenatal determinants. In an exploratory study of data collected within the Amsterdam Born Children and their Development (ABCD) study, we hypothesized that intra-uterine exposure to increased lipids is associated with adverse eating behaviour and increased energy intake in the offspring at age 5. During early gestation, a non-fasting blood sample was taken from 1463 non-diabetic Dutch women, including: total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), free fatty acids (FFA), Apolipoprotein A1 (ApoA1) and Apolipoprotein B (ApoB). Eating behaviour, measured using the Children’s Eating Behaviour Questionnaire, included food approaching (enjoyment of food, food responsiveness) and food avoidant behaviour (satiety responsiveness, slowness of eating). Energy intake (total energy, fat and carbohydrate intake) was measured using a validated food frequency questionnaire. Associations were analysed using multivariable linear regression. Increased maternal TC concentrations were associated with lower enjoyment of food, higher satiety responsiveness and increased slowness of eating, as well as decreased kcal and fat intake in the offspring. Elevated ApoA1 was associated with increased slowness of eating, lower enjoyment of food and lower kcal, fat and carbohydrate intake. ApoB was positively associated with satiety responsiveness and slowness of eating. Higher TG concentrations were associated with higher food responsiveness. Maternal FFA did not show significant associations. Findings demonstrated that the maternal prenatal lipid profile was associated with offspring’s eating behaviour and energy intake, although not always in the hypothesized direction.

Priming of Hypothalamic Ghrelin Signaling and Microglia Activation Exacerbate Feeding in Rats’ Offspring Following Maternal Overnutrition

“…Our data agree with the effects of maternal nutritional programming by caloric diets in murine models, which stimulates the proliferation of orexigenic peptide--producing neurons [13]] and leads to hyperphagia in the offspring [2]. Notably, the effect of plasma lipidomic profile leading to food intake in humans suggests that the higher prenatal triglycerides plasma concentrations in humans were associated with higher food responsiveness in offspring at 5 years old [14]. These results are also in line with murine models showing that increased perinatal triglyceride concentrations correlate with hyperphagia in the offspring [29].…”

“…Maternal obesity or maternal overnutrition promotes free fatty acid accumulation in plasma, which is associated with central and peripheral inflammatory response, potentially throughout the TLR-4 pathway [13,14,15]. In fact, TLR-4, IL-6, and IL-8 expression have been identified in the placenta of obese women when compared with lean women [16].…”

“…Maternal nutritional programming by overnutrition also stimulates proliferation of neuroepithelial and neuronal precursor cells in the hypothalamus during the embryonic period, leading to differentiation and proliferation of orexigenic peptide-producing neurons [13]. Furthermore, a recent clinical study demonstrated that the maternal prenatal lipid profile was associated with the offspring’s eating behavior and energy intake [14]. This evidence proposes that maternal nutritional programming might set an orexigenic phenotype in the offspring by increasing plasma ghrelin levels and orexigenic neuronal expression in the hypothalamic nucleus.…”

Children’s and Mothers’ Perspectives of Problematic Eating Behaviours in Young Children and Adolescents: An Exploratory Study

“…There are many questionnaires used in the assessment of children’s eating behaviour. However, very often discussed in the literature are, among others, the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire (TFEQ) [2,12,14,15], the Dutch Eating Behaviour Questionnaire for Children (DEBQ-C) [1,3,10,11,16,17] and the Child Eating Behaviour Questionnaire (CEBQ) [13,18,19].…”

Early ascending growth is associated with maternal lipoprotein profile during mid and late pregnancy and in cord blood

“…These metabolites have a capacity to influence epigenetic mechanisms and also the maturation of adipocytes of the offspring. Interestingly, elevated ApoA1 has even been connected to offspring eating behavior such as slowness of eating and lower enjoyment of food, as well as lower energy, fat and carbohydrate intake at the age of 5 years [ 46 ]. This could provide an explanation for the lower levels of ApoA1 associating with ascending growth in this study and also match our earlier results concerning the association between ascending growth and later childhood adiposity.…”