Nursing infants may be exposed to lead from breast milk, but relatively few data exist with which to evaluate and quantify this relationship. This route of exposure constitutes a potential infant hazard from mothers with current ongoing exposure to lead as well as from mothers who have been exposed previously due to the redistribution of cumulative maternal bone lead stores. We studied the rela...

BACKGROUND An increased oxidative level and decreased antioxidant activities in the blood of preeclamptic women have been reported by us and other workers. The present study was aimed to evaluate oxidative stress in infants born to preeclamptic mothers, and to examine whether cord blood with oxygen radical disease had different total enzymatic antioxidant status than those without preeclampsia....

background: we studied the role of maternal folic acid supplementation in modifying the effects of  methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (mthfr c677t and a1298c) gene polymorphisms in iranian children with oral clefts. materials and methods: forty?seven newborn infants with orofacial cleft and their mothers were selected randomly. mothers were matched regarding dietary folate intake.the genotypi...

BACKGROUND Age of puberty has declined substantially in developed settings and is now declining in the rest of the world with economic development. Early age of puberty is associated with non-communicable diseases in adulthood, and may be a long-term driver of population health with effects over generations. In a non-Western setting, we examined the association of maternal age of menarche with ...

Background: Naturally occurring CD4+CD25+ regulatory T cells (Treg) exert an important role in mediating maternal tolerance to the fetus during pregnancy. During pregnancy the elevated number of regulatory T cells (Tregs) correlates with 17-b oestradiol (E2) level. The role of maternal hormones in successful pregnancy is well known. Maternal hormones through re-engineering of the maternal immun...

BACKGROUND N-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA) may have multiple beneficial effects on the outcome of pregnancy, maternal health and child development. The present study introduced the protocol of a birth cohort study to examine the beneficial effects of n-3 PUFA status in pregnant Japanese women as an adjunct study of the Japan Environment and Children's Study (JECS). METHODS The JECS...

We studied the association between the prenatal diets of 212 mothers assessed by a semiquantitative food frequency questionnaire and the blood pressure of their infants. Prenatal potassium, calcium, and magnesium intakes were measured and adjusted for total caloric intake. Infant blood pressure was measured at 2-3 days and at 1, 6, and 12 months of age by using an ultrasonic-auscultatory device...

Recent studies on the relations of the fetal and maternal blood vessels in the cotyledonary placenta of the sheep (Barcroft and Barron') have demonstrated that the vessels are so arranged that the streams flow th.rough parallel cords of capillaries in opposite directions. This arrangement of the two sets of capillaries brings the fetal blood leaving the placenta in -relation to the maternal blo...

BACKGROUND The transport of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs), such as arachidonic acid (ARA, 20:4n-6) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, 22:6n-3), to the fetus from maternal stores increases depending on the fetal requirements for PUFA during the last trimester of pregnancy. Therefore, maternal blood PUFA changes physiologically with gestational age. However, the changes in PUFA levels in matern...