From Massachusetts General Hospital News and Public Affairs, April 5, 2021
Men and women whose mothers experienced stressful events during pregnancy regulate stress differently in the brain 45 years later, results of a long-term study demonstrate.
In a unique sample of 40 men and 40 women followed from the womb into their mid-forties, the brain imaging study showed that exposure during fetal development to inflammation-promoting natural substances called cytokines, produced by mothers under negative stress, results in sex-associated differences in how the adult brain responds to negative stressful situations more than 45 years after birth, reports Jill M. Goldstein, founder and executive director of the Innovation Center on Sex Differences in Medicine (ICON) at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and her co-authors.
The researchers found that abnormal levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines produced in mothers during pregnancy and the balance between pro-inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cytokines affect brain development differences by sex in their offspring that continue throughout life.
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