Project 171432

Overweight and obesity are characteristics of over one-half of the adult population in Canada and of 20-25% of children. The origins of the problem are many and complex. However the focus of this research is on the mother's diet, specifically the vitamin component. Concurrent with the obesity epidemic has been the increased use of multivitamins during pregnancy and, in the US and partially in Canada, the appearance of many food products that reflect a liberal discretionary fortification policy. It is known that vitamins play an active role during development in determining the expression of genes. Thus while they do not determine the genome they affect the phenotype associated with the genome of the baby. Our hypothesis is that vitamin consumption during pregnancy, in both excess and inadequate amounts, programs the fetus for obesity and metabolic disease in later life, even though both mother and the baby are judged to be well-nourished. Specifically we hypothesize that disruption of the development of the brain's food intake regulatory system in utero determines the outcome. The hypothesis is being tested in a rat model. Our work has potential to lead to a new understanding of the role of vitamins in development of regulatory systems for food intake and metabolism. The results may provide a foundation for investigations of the effect of both inadequate and excess intakes of vitamins and other bioactive supplements during pregnancy on programming for chronic diseases in later life in humans.

using a rat model to investigate the role of maternal vitamin consumption during pregnancy in the development of food intake and metabolic regulation of the offspring