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MILJØFORSK-Miljøforskning for en grønn samfunnsomstilling

The impact of pre- and postnatal exposure to mixtures of chemicals on catch-up growth, obesity and cardiometabolic health in children

Alternative title: Betydningen av pre- og postnatal eksponering for blandinger av kjemikalier på tidlig vekst, fedme og kardiometabolsk helse blant barn

Awarded: NOK 5.1 mill.

In the CATCHUP project, we investigate the effect of early life exposure to environmental chemicals on child's cardiometabolic health, growth and risk of obesity. We focus on periods of increased vulnerability (pregnancy and early childhood) to the toxic effects of environmental pollutants because the fetus and the young child are at heightened risk of developmental impairment. For this project, it is important to investigate the role of diet, as many foods contain both environmental chemicals and beneficial nutrients and diet is a determinant of cardiometabolic health and obesity. Overall, the results from the CATCH-UP project show that exposure to environmental chemicals are linked to dietary habits and socioeconomic position. Diet, and specifically fish and fruit consumption, are modifiable key factors to reduce exposure to environmental chemicals with known toxicological properties in accordance with health-based dietary recommendations. Our results provide no evidence of detrimental effects of maternal fish consumption in pregnancy on child growth and metabolic health when the fish consumption is in line with current guidelines. Our findings support that prenatal, but not postnatal exposure to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs), contributes to an unfavorable cardiometabolic profile in childhood. Finally, increased inflammatory biomarkers and disturbed metabolism pathways of amino-acids and lipids could be an underlying mechanism linking prenatal exposure to PFAS and mercury with an unfavorable cardiometabolic profile in childhood. Without excluding the major determinants of obesity, our results also supported that poor diet in early childhood is associated with high risk of obesity later in life and that Norwegian children had poor adherence to the recommendations for a healthy diet, similar to other populations of the same age group, and this finding calls for attention. Our results include eight scientific papers in top ranking peer-reviewed journals, one master thesis and several dissemination activities, such as presentations in scientific conferences, invited lectures to academic scientific audiences and media publications. Additional work related to this project has been submitted and more publications are expected after the end of the project. Our project created synergies with other ongoing scientific projects (NRC and EU funded) with similar overarching aim. A research stay at the Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, USA, within the project period facilitated further collaborations and contributed substantially to the success of the CATCHUP project. Through the CATCH-UP project we have achieved to build an international network of interdisciplinary scientists, under the main interests of i) providing high quality scientific evidence of the harmful long-term effects of chemicals exposures in early life, ii) prioritizing toxic chemicals for regulation and iii) reducing exposures to toxic environmental contaminants during important developmental periods. This project has generated, and it is expected to generate more high quality and novel scientific evidence for the harmful effects of environmental toxicants, using state-of-the art methodology. Our scientific publications, contribute to the scientific community of environmental health scientists by providing novel evidence about the interactions between nutrients and harmful contaminants, coming from same dietary sources, on health (protective, synergistic, additive effects), as well as the underlying biological mechanisms, that are currently an area of vigorous research. The scientific community is aware that the assessment of mixtures of exposure is a more realistic approach to study the exposure-outcome associations and our project is contributing to the continuation of this approach. Due to our approach to carefully examine diet, our scientific results are interesting for nutrition scientist as well and we expect to increase the awareness that diet is not only a source of nutrients, but also a source of exposure to harmful contaminants that can contribute to disease burden. Our findings can contribute to evidence-based regulatory work by national and international authorities, aiming to assess the risks of human exposure to chemicals, and assess the risk/benefit balance of dietary intakes. Such regulatory bodies are the basis for further policymaking and decisions related to public health. In the long-term, we expect that results from this research project will help to protect vulnerable population groups from the harmful effects of environmental chemicals in food and contribute to promote safe and healthy diets.

Through the CATCH-UP project, we have achieved to build an international scientific network and a fruitful environment for academic development. We contributed with novel and innovative scientific knowledge in the fields of environmental health and nutrition science. Our project results will contribute to evidence-based regulatory work by national and international authorities. We anticipate that our studies on fish intake in pregnancy will be included in the ongoing assessment of risk and benefits of fish intake by the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food and Environment (VKM) and in the new Nordic Nutrition dietary recommendations, (both to be published 2022). In addition, our findings can be used in future risk assessment by Norwegian (VKM, Miljødirektoratet) and international authorities (EFSA, ECHA). In the long-term, we anticipate that our research contributes to the protection of the society from the harmful effects of chemicals and the promotion of safe and healthy diets.

The prevalence of metabolism related disorders, including obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes is rapidly growing across the globe followed by a dramatic increase in the rates of childhood obesity. Childhood obesity damages health early in life and it is a multifactorial issue related, among others, to environment and genetic factors operating even in-utero. We need to identify modifiable risk factors that contribute to the development and continuity of unhealthy weight, in order to address the personal and population-wide health burden of the obesity epidemic. We aim to investigate how environmental factors in-utero and early childhood may impact early growth and metabolic disorders in childhood, using an exposome-type approach focused on environmental contaminants and genetics. Our study population includes ~80,000 mother-child pairs from the largest pregnancy cohort worldwide (The Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study; MoBa) and 1,200 mother-child pairs from a six-country EU project, the HELIX. We will incorporate extensive questionnaire data,biomarker measurements,clinical examination and genetic data to achieve our aims. Innovative approaches and strengths of this project are:i)the study of mixtures of environmental toxicants that better represent real-life exposures;ii)the use of advance growth models to study child growth by incorporating the vast amount of longitudinal anthropometric measurements throughout childhood;iii)the use of adiposity and other cardiometabolic factors to provide information on clinical health effects; the incorporation of genetic data, as genetics are a large part of the etiology of obesity. By using cutting-edge research methods and in cooperation with national and international expert researchers, this inter-disciplinary project will contribute new scientific knowledge in areas with large existing knowledge gaps in Norway. Such knowledge is essential for Norwegian public administrationa and public health policy design.

Publications from Cristin

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Funding scheme:

MILJØFORSK-Miljøforskning for en grønn samfunnsomstilling