Department of Mental Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University.
Dev Psychobiol. 2024 Feb;66(2). doi: 10.1002/dev.22464. Epub 2024 Jan 28.
Maternal exposure to childhood adversity is associated with detrimental health outcomes throughout the lifespan and may have implications for offspring. Evidence links maternal adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) to detrimental birth outcomes, yet the impact on the infant's epigenome is unclear. Moreover, maternal sleep habits during pregnancy may influence this association. Here, we explore whether restless sleep during pregnancy moderates the association between exposure to maternal childhood adversity and infant epigenetic age acceleration in 332 mother-infant dyads (56% female; 39% Black; 25% Hispanic). During the 2 trimester, mothers self-reported childhood adversity and past-week restless sleep; DNA methylation from umbilical vein endothelial cells was used to estimate five epigenetic clocks. Multivariable linear regression was used to test study hypotheses. Despite no evidence of main effects, there was evidence of an interaction between maternal ACEs and restless sleep in predicting infant epigenetic age acceleration using the EPIC Gestational Age clock. Only infants whose mothers reported exposure to both ACEs and restless sleep demonstrated accelerated epigenetic aging. Results provide preliminary evidence that maternal childhood adversity and sleep may influence the infant epigenome.
母亲在儿童期经历逆境与整个生命周期中的健康不良后果有关，并且可能对后代产生影响。有证据表明，母亲在儿童期经历的逆境（ACEs）与不良的出生结果有关，但这对婴儿的表观基因组的影响尚不清楚。此外，母亲在怀孕期间的睡眠习惯可能会影响这种关联。在这里，我们探讨了孕妇睡眠不安是否会调节母亲在儿童期经历逆境与 332 对母婴对子（56%为女性；39%为黑人；25%为西班牙裔）中婴儿表观遗传年龄加速之间的关联。在妊娠中期，母亲自我报告了儿童期逆境和过去一周的睡眠不安；使用脐带静脉内皮细胞中的 DNA 甲基化来估计五个表观遗传时钟。使用多变量线性回归检验了研究假设。尽管没有主要效应的证据，但在使用 EPICGestational Age 时钟预测婴儿表观遗传年龄加速时，存在母亲 ACEs 和睡眠不安之间相互作用的证据。只有报告同时接触 ACEs 和睡眠不安的母亲的婴儿表现出加速的表观遗传衰老。研究结果初步表明，母亲在儿童期经历逆境和睡眠可能会影响婴儿的表观基因组。
