Bone Abstracts

Experimental studies in animals indicate that particular maternal exposures during pregnancy can have specific effects on body composition in the offspring, with long-term implications for subsequent metabolic phenotype and cardiovascular risk. In animals the environment during early life induces altered phenotypes in ways which are influenced or mediated by epigenetic mechanisms, but until recently there has been little direct evidence in humans and understanding of which dev...

Recent evidence demonstrates that the environment in early life can have important effects on fetal and postnatal growth, on later body composition and on risk of developing common non-communicable diseases in later life. In animals the environment during early life induces altered phenotypes in ways which are influenced or mediated by epigenetic mechanisms. The latter include DNA methylation, covalent modifications of histones and non-coding RNAs. Most is known about DNA meth...

Animal studies suggest that fetal movements are key to healthy skeletal development, but evidence in humans is limited. Breech presentation occurs in 3% of term births and is associated with reduced fetal movement and higher incidence of hip dysplasias, but more general effects on bone development have not been explored.Offspring whole body bone outcomes were measured using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) at mean(SD) 6(5) days after birth in 993 i...

Objectives: Serum 25(OH)-vitamin D (25(OH)D) concentration is known to influence muscle function in postnatal life. Maternal 25(OH)D status during pregnancy has been implicated in the fetal programming of bone and fat mass, but little is known about its role in determining offspring muscle development. We investigated the associations between maternal serum 25(OH)D concentration in pregnancy and offspring muscle mass and strength at 4 years.Materials and...

Maternal vitamin D status has been positively associated with infant bone mass in observational studies. We therefore evaluated whether 1000 IU/day cholecalciferol during pregnancy would lead to greater offspring bone mass at birth, in a UK, multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial (MAVIDOS, ISRCTN82927713).At 12 weeks’ gestation, pregnant women with a serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] 25-100 nmol/l were randomised to either...