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Metabolic programming: Role of nutrition in the immediate postnatal life

  • SSIEM Symposium 2008
  • Published:
Journal of Inherited Metabolic Disease

Summary

Although genes and dietary habits are generally implicated in the aetiology of the prevailing obesity epidemic, the steep increase in the incidence of obesity within a relatively short span of time suggests that other contributing factors may be at play. The role of nutritional experience during the very early periods of life is increasingly being recognized as contributing to growth and metabolic changes in later life. Epidemiological data and studies from animal models have established a strong correlation between an aberrant intrauterine environment and adult-onset disorders in offspring. The nutritional experience in the immediate postnatal life is another independent factor contributing to the development of metabolic diseases in adulthood. Although studies on the small-litter rat model have shown that overnourishment during the suckling period results in adult-onset metabolic disorders, our studies have shown that a change in the quality of calories—specifically, increased carbohydrate intake by newborn rat pups in the immediate postnatal period—results in chronic hyperinsulinaemia and adult-onset obesity. Several functional alterations in islets and in the hypothalamic energy homeostatic mechanism appear to support this phenotype. Remarkably, female rats that underwent the high-carbohydrate dietary modification as neonates spontaneously transmitted the obesity phenotype to their offspring, thus establishing a vicious generational effect. The high-carbohydrate diet-fed rat model has particular relevance in the context of the current human infant feeding practices: reduction in breast feeding and increase in formula feeding for infants, accompanied by early introduction of carbohydrate-enriched baby foods.

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Abbreviations

2-HC rats:

offspring of HC female rats

α 2aAR:

alpha2a-adrenergic receptor

α-MSH:

α-melanocortin-stimulating hormone

AgRP:

agouti-related polypeptide

ANS:

autonomic nervous system

ARC:

arcuate nucleus

BMI:

body mass index

CART:

cocaine and amphetamine related transcript

CRF:

corticotrophin-releasing factor

GAL:

galanin

HC rats:

rat pups raised on the HC milk formula

HC:

high-carbohydrate milk formula

IR-β :

insulin receptor β

MC3R:

muscarinic-type 3 receptor

MC4R:

muscarinic-type 4 receptor

NPY:

neuropeptide Y

Ob-RB:

leptin receptor long form

POMC:

pro-opiomelanocortin

SL:

small litter

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Acknowledgement

This work was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health Grant DK61518.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, 140 Farber Hall, 3435 Main Street, Buffalo, NY, 14214, USA

    M. S. Patel & M. Srinivasan

  2. Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, USA

    S. G. Laychock

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  1. M. S. Patel
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  2. M. Srinivasan
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  3. S. G. Laychock
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Correspondence to M. S. Patel.

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Communicating editor: Georg Hoffmann

Competing interests: None declared

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Patel, M.S., Srinivasan, M. & Laychock, S.G. Metabolic programming: Role of nutrition in the immediate postnatal life. J Inherit Metab Dis 32, 218–228 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10545-008-1033-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10545-008-1033-4

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