Poor nutrition during pregnancy may increase the risk of heart disease in children

^{Translation by Diana Taborda}

Malnutrition during pregnancy has a strong impact on the foetal heart, increasing the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases in the long term. This is the conclusion of a study by a team of researchers from the Centre for Neurosciences and Cell Biology of the University of Coimbra (CNC-UC).

The study aimed to assess whether maternal malnutrition causes changes at the level of mitochondria (the energy-producing cell organelles) in the heart of foetuses, suggesting that these babies should receive medical follow-up throughout their lives, given their increased risk for developing cardiovascular disease.

Research using an animal model showed that a 30% reduction in the amount of food fed to mothers during pregnancy produced profound changes in the function of the babies' cardiac mitochondria. These changes were found to interfere with how mitochondria produce energy and how they participate in various essential cellular functions, which may promote the onset of cardiac dysfunction earlier in adulthood.

It was also observed that the effect of malnutrition during pregnancy is more prominent in the hearts of male foetuses. According to the authors, this difference may explain the different proneness of men and women to heart disease throughout their lives.

This work, which has already been published in the journal Clinical Science, is part of a larger project that began in 2009 and aims to identify the effects of nutrition during pregnancy on foetal health, particularly at the level of mitochondrial function. In addition to the University of Coimbra (Paulo Oliveira, author), it also involves the University of Porto (Susana Pereira, first author) and two US universities - the University of Wyoming and the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio.

The scientific paper is available here.