TY  - JOUR
A1  - Gilles, Maria
A1  - Otto, Henrike
A1  - Wolf, Isabell A. C.
A1  - Scharnholz, Barbara
A1  - Peus, Verena
A1  - Schredl, Michael
A1  - Suetterlin, Marc W.
A1  - Witt, Stephanie H.
A1  - Rietschel, Marcella
A1  - Laucht, Manfred
A1  - Deuschle, Michael
T1  - Maternal hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) system activity and stress measures at birth
JF  - Psychoneuroendocrinology
N2  - Background: Prenatal maternal stress might be a risk for the developing fetus and may have long-lasting effects on child and adult vulnerability to somatic and psychiatric disease. Over-exposure of the unborn to excess glucocorticoids and subsequent alteration of fetal development is hypothesized to be one of the key mechanisms linking prenatal stress with negative child outcome. Methods: In this prospective longitudinal study, mothers-to-be (n = 405) in late pregnancy (36.8 +/- 1.9 weeks of gestational age) and their singleton neonates were studied. We investigated the impact of different prenatal stress indices derived from six stress variables (perceived stress, specific prenatal worries, negative life events, symptoms of depression, trait anxiety, neuroticism) and diurnal maternal saliva cortisol secretion on gestational age and anthropometric measures at birth.
KW  - Early life stress
KW  - Gestational age
KW  - Anthropometric measures at birth
KW  - Cortisol
KW  - Prenatal distress
KW  - Pregnancy
Y1  - 2018
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2018.04.022
SN  - 0306-4530
VL  - 94
SP  - 152
EP  - 161
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - Oxford
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Witt, Stephanie H.
A1  - Frank, Josef
A1  - Gilles, Maria
A1  - Lang, Maren
A1  - Treutlein, Jens
A1  - Streit, Fabian
A1  - Wolf, Isabell A. C.
A1  - Peus, Verena
A1  - Scharnholz, Barbara
A1  - Send, Tabea S.
A1  - Heilmann-Heimbach, Stefanie
A1  - Sivalingam, Sugirthan
A1  - Dukal, Helene
A1  - Strohmaier, Jana
A1  - Sütterlin, Marc
A1  - Arloth, Janine
A1  - Laucht, Manfred
A1  - Nöthen, Markus M.
A1  - Deuschle, Michael
A1  - Rietschel, Marcella
T1  - Impact on birth weight of maternal smoking throughout pregnancy mediated by DNA methylation
JF  - BMC genomics
N2  - Background: Cigarette smoking has severe adverse health consequences in adults and in the offspring of mothers who smoke during pregnancy. One of the most widely reported effects of smoking during pregnancy is reduced birth weight which is in turn associated with chronic disease in adulthood. Epigenome-wide association studies have revealed that smokers show a characteristic "smoking methylation pattern", and recent authors have proposed that DNA methylation mediates the impact of maternal smoking on birth weight. The aims of the present study were to replicate previous reports that methylation mediates the effect of maternal smoking on birth weight, and for the first time to investigate whether the observed mediation effects are sex-specific in order to account for known sex-specific differences in methylation levels. Methods: Methylation levels in the cord blood of 313 newborns were determined using the Illumina HumanMethylation450K Beadchip. A total of 5,527 CpG sites selected on the basis of evidence from the literature were tested. To determine whether the observed association between maternal smoking and birth weight was attributable to methylation, mediation analyses were performed for significant CpG sites. Separate analyses were then performed in males and females. Results: Following quality control, 282 newborns eventually remained in the analysis. A total of 25 mothers had smoked consistently throughout the pregnancy. The birthweigt of newborns whose mothers had smoked throughout pregnancy was reduced by >200g. After correction for multiple testing, 30 CpGs showed differential methylation in the maternal smoking subgroup including top "smoking methylation pattern" genes AHRR, MYO1G, GFI1, CYP1A1, and CNTNAP2. The effect of maternal smoking on birth weight was partly mediated by the methylation of cg25325512 (PIM1); cg25949550 (CNTNAP2); and cg08699196 (ITGB7). Sex-specific analyses revealed a mediating effect for cg25949550 (CNTNAP2) in male newborns. Conclusion: The present data replicate previous findings that methylation can mediate the effect of maternal smoking on birth weight. The analysis of sex-dependent mediation effects suggests that the sex of the newborn may have an influence. Larger studies are warranted to investigate the role of both the identified differentially methylated loci and the sex of the newborn in mediating the association between maternal smoking during pregnancy and birth weight.
KW  - DNA methylation
KW  - Smoking
KW  - Birth weight
KW  - Mediation analysis
Y1  - 2018
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1186/s12864-018-4652-7
SN  - 1471-2164
VL  - 19
PB  - BMC
CY  - London
ER  -