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Research has shown that a mother’s diet during pregnancy, particularly one that is high-fat, may program her baby for future risk of certain diseases such as diabetes. Changing the baby’s diet to a low-fat diet can change the effects of maternal diet. Early-life nutrition affects later generations and offspring health. Epigenetics does not involve changes to the DNA sequence, but are changes that modify gene expression. A person’s epigenome is inherited, but it is also reversible based on what you eat, whether you exercise, and even where you live.
The researchers examined rats that were exposed to a high-fat diet during gestation and lactation. At weaning, some of the rats stayed on a high-fat diet and some were put on a low-fat diet. The researchers then did whole-genome sequencing of the rats, focusing on differences between gene expression in the livers of the two sets of rats. In particular, they wanted to see if DNA methylation in the liver adapted to the new, low-fat diet. DNA methylation is a mechanism cells use to control gene expression at the epigenetic level. It involves the addition of a methyl group to DNA that changes the way genes are transcribed and affects gene expression.
Scans showed remodeled DNA methylation patterns in the low-fat group, which changed gene expression associated with fat metabolism and inflammation in the liver; there was less fat accumulation and inflammation in the liver. This shows that DNA methylation is responsive to dietary changes later in life. While there were physiological changes in the rats on low-fat diets, including lower body weight.
The early-life environment will mark your epigenome in a certain way so that you may develop certain phenotypes or disease states. Our study shows that after that early programming state, after weaning, and after the lactation period, when we introduced a new type of diet it changed the epigenome in a way that actually affects metabolism and potentially will reduce some of the damage caused by an early-life high-fat exposure. Switching to a different diet you can specifically remodel the epigenome in the liver related to certain metabolic pathways.
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