Journal
BIOCHIMICA ET BIOPHYSICA ACTA-MOLECULAR BASIS OF DISEASE
Volume 1863, Issue 6, Pages 1371-1381Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.bbadis.2017.02.009
Keywords
Blastocyst metabolism; Bone health; Developmental programming; Fetal growth; Paternal diet; Placental function
Funding
- Aston Research Centre for Healthy Ageing fellowship
- Society for Reproduction and Fertility Academic scholarship
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Defining the mechanisms underlying the programming of early life growth is fundamental for improving adult health and wellbeing. While the association between maternal diet, offspring growth and adult disease risk is well-established, the effect of father's diet on offspring development is largely unknown. Therefore, we fed male mice an imbalanced low protein diet (LPD) to determine the impact on post-fertilisation development and fetal growth. We observed that in preimplantation embryos derived from LPD fed males, expression of multiple genes within the central metabolic AMPK pathway was reduced. In late gestation, paternal LPD programmed increased fetal weight, however, placental weight was reduced, resulting in an elevated fetal:placental weight ratio. Analysis of gene expression patterns revealed increased levels of transporters for calcium, amino acids and glucose within LPD placentas. Furthermore, placental expression of the epigenetic regulators Dnmtl and Dnmt3L were increased also, coinciding with altered patterns of maternal and paternal imprinted genes. More strikingly, we observed fetal skeletal development was perturbed in response to paternal LPD. Here, while offspring of LPD fed males possessed larger skeletons, their bones comprised lower volumes of high mineral density in combination with reduced maturity of bone apatite. These data offer new insight in the underlying programming mechanisms linking poor paternal diet at the time of conception with the development and growth of his offspring. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available