Body Size at Birth Is Associated with Food and Nutrient Intake in Adulthood

Background

Small body size at birth is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. Dietary habits are tightly linked with these disorders, but the association between body size at birth and adult diet has been little studied. We examined the association between body size at birth and intake of foods and macronutrients in adulthood.

Methodology/Principal Findings

We studied 1797 participants, aged 56 to 70, of the Helsinki Birth Cohort Study, whose birth weight and length were recorded. Preterm births were excluded. During a clinical study, diet was assessed with a validated food-frequency questionnaire. A linear regression model adjusted for potential confounders was used to assess the associations. Intake of fruits and berries was 13.26 g (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.56, 25.96) higher per 1 kg/m³ increase in ponderal index (PI) at birth, and 83.16 g (95% CI: 17.76, 148.56) higher per 1 kg higher birth weight. One unit higher PI at birth was associated with 0.14% of energy (E%) lower intake of fat (95% CI: -0.26, -0.03) and 0.18 E% higher intake of carbohydrates (95% CI: 0.04, 0.32) as well as 0.08 E% higher sucrose (95% CI: 0.00, 0.15), 0.05 E% higher fructose (95% CI: 0.01, 0.09), and 0.18 g higher fiber (95% CI: 0.02, 0.34) intake in adulthood. Similar associations were observed between birth weight and macronutrient intake.

Conclusions

Prenatal growth may modify later life food and macronutrient intake. Altered dietary habits could potentially explain an increased risk of chronic disease in individuals born with small body size.     

Early growth and death from cardiovascular disease in women.

OBJECTIVE--To determine whether the link suggested between growth in utero and during infancy and death from cardiovascular disease in men is also present in women. DESIGN--Follow up study of women and men whose birth weight and weight at 1 year of age had been recorded. SETTING--Hertfordshire, England. SUBJECTS--5585 women and 10,141 men born during 1911-30. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES--Standardised mortality ratios for cardiovascular disease. RESULTS--Among women and men death rates from cardiovascular disease fell progressively between the low and high birth weights groups (chi 2 = 4.3, p = 0.04 for women, chi 2 = 8.5, p < 0.005 for men). Cardiovascular deaths in men but not women were also strongly related to weight at 1 year, falling progressively between the low and high weight groups (chi 2 = 27.5, p < 0.0001). The highest cardiovascular death rates in women were among those with below average birth weight but above average weight at 1 year. In men the highest rates were among those with below average birth weight and below average weight at 1 year. CONCLUSION--Relations between cardiovascular disease and birth weight are similar in men and women. In men cardiovascular disease is also related to weight gain in infancy.     

Autophagy Limits Endotoxemic Acute Kidney Injury and Alters Renal Tubular Epithelial Cell Cytokine Expression

Sepsis related acute kidney injury (AKI) is a common in-hospital complication with a dismal prognosis. Our incomplete understanding of disease pathogenesis has prevented the identification of hypothesis-driven preventive or therapeutic interventions. Increasing evidence in ischemia-reperfusion and nephrotoxic mouse models of AKI support the theory that autophagy protects renal tubular epithelial cells (RTEC) from injury. However, the role of RTEC autophagy in septic AKI remains unclear. We observed that lipopolysaccharide (LPS), a mediator of gram-negative bacterial sepsis, induces RTEC autophagy in vivo and in vitro through TLR4-initiated signaling. We modeled septic AKI through intraperitoneal LPS injection in mice in which autophagy-related protein 7 was specifically knocked out in the renal proximal tubules (ATG7KO). Compared to control littermates, ATG7KO mice developed more severe renal dysfunction (24hr BUN 100.1mg/dl +/- 14.8 vs 54.6mg/dl +/- 11.3) and parenchymal injury. After injection with LPS, analysis of kidney lysates identified higher IL-6 expression and increased STAT3 activation in kidney lysates from ATG7KO mice compared to controls. In vitro experiments confirmed an altered response to LPS in RTEC with genetic or pharmacological impairment of autophagy. In conclusion, RTEC autophagy protects against endotoxin induced injury and regulates downstream effects of RTEC TLR4 signaling.     

Human trabecular meshwork cell behavior is influenced by collagen scaffold pore architecture and glycosaminoglycan composition

Glaucoma is a degenerative eye disease in which damage to the optic nerve leads to a characteristic loss of vision. The primary risk factor for glaucoma is an increased intraocular pressure that is caused by an imbalance of aqueous humor generation and subsequent drainage through the trabecular meshwork (TM) drainage system. The small size, donor tissue limitations, and high complexity of the TM make it difficult to research the relationship between the TM cells and their immediate environment. Thus, a biomaterial-based approach may be more appropriate for research manipulations and in vitro drug development platforms. In this work, human TM (hTM) cells were cultured on various collagen scaffolds containing different glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) and different pore architectures to better understand how hTM cells respond to changes in their extracellular environment. Cellular response was measured by quantifying cellular proliferation and expression of an important extracellular matrix protein, fibronectin. The pore architecture of the scaffolds was altered using freeze-casting technique to make both large and small pores that were aligned or with a non-aligned random structure. The composition of the scaffolds was altered with the addition of chondroitin sulfate and/or hyaluronic acid. It was found that the hTM cells grown on large pore scaffolds proliferate more than those grown on small pores. There was an increase in the fibronectin expression with the incorporation of GAGs, and its morphology was changed by the underlying pore architecture. This work will help provide an insight into the behavior of hTM cells when introducing changes in their microenvironment.     

Cooperation can promote rescue or lead to evolutionary suicide during environmental change

The adaptation of populations to changing conditions may be affected by interactions between individuals. For example, when cooperative interactions increase fecundity, they may allow populations to maintain high densities and thus keep track of moving environmental optima. Simultaneously, changes in population density alter the marginal benefits of cooperative investments, creating a feedback loop between population dynamics and the evolution of cooperation. Here we model how the evolution of cooperation interacts with adaptation to changing environments. We hypothesize that environmental change lowers population size and thus promotes the evolution of cooperation, and that this, in turn, helps the population keep up with the moving optimum. However, we find that the evolution of cooperation can have qualitatively different effects, depending on which fitness component is reduced by the costs of cooperation. If the costs decrease fecundity, cooperation indeed speeds adaptation by increasing population density; if, in contrast, the costs decrease viability, cooperation may instead slow adaptation by lowering the effective population size, leading to evolutionary suicide. Thus, cooperation can either promote or—counterintuitively—hinder adaptation to a changing environment. Finally, we show that our model can also be generalized to other social interactions by discussing the evolution of competition during environmental change.     

Application of “Streamlined” Material Input per Service Unit Concept to Small Residential Districts in China

This article reports a new application of material and energy accounting techniques to characterize and quantify the relationships between material input (and the related energy flows and emissions) and the services provided (i.e., material input per service unit [MIPS]) at the neighborhood level. The case study focuses on China's small residential district (SRD). It is concluded that linking a service (in this case, residential function) enabled by a given product (neighborhood development) to the amount of materials, energy, and emissions used or produced in creating that product offers a potential way to reduce the environmental impact of that service through more efficient use of materials, enlarged service scales, and improved buying decisions.