Maternal diet ‘can alter a child’s DNA’

A new study has suggested that a woman's diet before pregnancy could have a significant and permanent effect on the DNA of her future children.

Carried out by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the study involved an experiment of nature in rural Gambia, where a dependence on self-grown foods and a seasonal climate means dietary patterns vary greatly between rainy and dry seasons.

Assessing 2,000 women, they found that the children of pregnant women who conceived at the peak of the rainy season saw significant genetic variations to those who became pregnant at the peak of the dry season.

Although these epigenetic effects were observed, their functional consequences remain unknown, meaning more research will be needed to unpick the full implications of the discovery.

Senior author Dr Branwen Hennig at the MRC Gambia Unit and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said: "Our results represent the first demonstration in humans that a mother's nutritional wellbeing at the time of conception can change how her child's genes will be interpreted, with a lifelong impact."

It has already been established that eating habits during pregnancy can have numerous effects on the health of the child, but this is one of the first studies to extend this to before conception in humans.