Developmental Programming of Metabolism

The field of developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD) provides a new perspective of understanding disease pathogenesis and offers the possibility of designing novel interventions for preventing metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disorders. It is known that critical life processes such as rapid growth, cellular replication, differentiation, and functional maturation of organ systems occur from conception to first few years of life. Perturbations from environmental triggers, such as nutrients and environmental contaminants, during this critical period of development can therefore have long-lasting effects on the offspring. Extensive efforts to understand these early life perturbations and their association with later onset of metabolic diseases have therefore been crucial in determining the mechanisms that may drive the pathogenesis of metabolic disorders. Many physiological and molecular mechanisms have been proposed; however, there remains a lack of understanding of causal pathways. New research is therefore needed to advance our understanding about developmental programming of metabolic disorders and underlying mechanisms.

This Research Topic aims to bring together the latest research uncovering the health impacts of parental (maternal/paternal) perturbations and mechanisms underlying metabolic disorders in offspring. Animal and human studies exploring new metabolic health endpoints, novel mechanisms of mitochondrial or immune dysfunction, and novel biomarker studies of epigenome or metabolome are particularly encouraged. Developmental exposure studies including but not limited to exposure to environmental chemicals or suboptimal nutrition (nutrient excess or deficit), and pregnancy complications like gestational diabetes, gestational hypertension, maternal obesity and intrauterine growth restriction, as well as intervention studies spanning the critical window of programming are also encouraged.

This Research Topic welcomes original research (animal models, human studies and epidemiology studies), narrative reviews, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses.