Distinguishing these infants may allow targeted interventions early in life to optimize adult health. In this study, we examined PHLDA2 expression in placentas of 102 infants born to mothers participating in the Southampton Women’s Survey for whom there is detailed information about fetal growth and placental weight at term [25]. In addition to measurements of fetal growth velocity, we correlated

placental expression of PHLDA2 with the infant’s anthropometry, bone mass screening assay and body composition at birth (measured by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA)) and, where data were available, bone mass and body composition in early childhood. We found no significant relationship between PHLDA2 expression and birth weight in this cohort, but there were relationships between higher placental PHLDA2 expression and lower femur growth rate between 19 and 34 weeks of gestation and lower bone mineral content at 4 years. Details of the Southampton Women’s Survey (SWS) have been published previously [25]. In a group of pregnancies the placenta was collected within 30 min of delivery. The weight of the placenta Epacadostat manufacturer was measured after removing any obvious blood clots, cutting the umbilical cord

flush with its insertion into the placenta, trimming away surrounding membranes and removing the amnion from the basal plate. To ensure that samples collected were representative of the placenta as a whole, 5 villous tissue samples were selected using a stratified random sampling method and stored at − 80 °C. For this study, we selected 102 placentas (from 300 collected in total) based on availability of neonatal DXA data. In 58 pregnancies, measures of fetal size and growth velocity were available from ultrasound scans performed by a research sonographer at 19 and 34 weeks gestation. Using

a high resolution ultrasound Branched chain aminotransferase system (Kretz Voluson 730), head circumference (HC) was obtained using an ellipse superimposed on a static scan image of the horizontal plane at the level of the thalamus and the cavum septi pellucidi [26]. Abdominal circumference (AC) was also similarly measured using a transverse section of the fetal abdomen at the level of the fetal stomach and where a short section of umbilical vein can be identified. Femur length (FL) was measured in longitudinal section by placing the linear calipers at the ends of the diaphysis, with the femur horizontally positioned in the scan plane [26]. Three measurements were made of each parameter and the mean used in the statistical analysis [27]. Precision of the measurements was assessed by replicate examinations in 50 pregnancies at both 19 and 34 weeks. The coefficient of variation for triplicate linear measurements was 0.6% at 19 weeks and 0.4% at 34 weeks [27]. For elliptical measurements the values were 4.4% at 19 and 3.2% at 34 weeks.