Telomere Length in Newborns is Related to Maternal Stress During Pregnancy

Abstract

Telomere length (TL) is a marker of biological aging, and numerous studies have shown associations between TL and somatic or psychiatric disorders. Research also indicates an association between maternal stress during pregnancy and TL in the offspring. The present study investigated possible associations between TL and: (1) maternal perceived stress during pregnancy; (2) a maternal lifetime history of psychiatric disorder (lifetime PD); and (3) paternal age. TL was analyzed in 319 newborns and 318 mothers from a predominantly Caucasian sample (n=273 Caucasian newborns and n=274 Caucasian mothers). Two key findings were observed. First, maternal perceived stress during pregnancy was associated with shorter telomeres in newborns but not with maternal TL. Second, maternal lifetime PD was associated with shorter maternal telomeres, but not with TL in newborns. Paternal age was not associated with TL in newborns. The finding that maternal stress during pregnancy is associated with shorter telomeres in newborns supports the results of smaller previous studies. The fact that a relation between maternal prenatal stress and TL was observed in the offspring but not in mothers may be attributable to a high vulnerability to stress during intrauterine development of a maturing organism. To our knowledge, this is the largest study to date to show that maternal stress during pregnancy but not maternal lifetime PD is associated with shorter telomeres in the offspring.

Telomere length: how the length makes a difference

“…Additionally, a correlation between the effects of prenatal exposures and maternal conditions such as obstetric complications, BMI, state of nutrition, stress and sociologic status during pregnancy, and disadvantageous birth outcomes of offspring in telomere length manner was shown [49][50][51]. For example, the association between maternal stress during pregnancy and shorter offspring telomere length was confirmed by many authors [52][53][54]. Other authors revealed an association between low birth weight and shorter telomere length in peripheral blood mononuclear cells in preschool aged children [55].…”

Influence of music therapy on the telomere length: a brief review and a pilot study

“…Maternal stress during pregnancy, but not her lifestyle, also lead to the shortening of the telomere length in newborns. The fact that the relationship between maternal prenatal stress and the telomere length was observed in offspring but not in mothers can be explained by high vulnerability to stress of a maturing organism during foetal development (Send et al, 2017).…”

Telomere length determinants in childhood

“…Finally, it was demonstrated that maternal lifetime history of a psychiatric disorder causes shortening of maternal TL but does not affect newborn TL. Acute stress during pregnancy, on the other hand, is related to shorter TL of a newborn but does not affect the mother's TL [95].…”

“…TL in children can be affected by oxidative, immune, endocrine and metabolic pathways in a way that accelerates cellular dysfunction over the lifespan [11,92], thus reflecting the effect of specific conditions on the later susceptibility to a disease. Maternal stress [93][94][95], hormones [96], smoking [97], race [98], vitamin concentrations [99,100], pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI) [101] and other factors showed correlation with TL and pointed out the importance of in utero exposures in the regulation of newborn TL. In this section we will focus on some of the most pertinent antenatal determinants.…”