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Smoking Mothers May Alter the DNA of Their Children

Posted by Unknown on from the that-explains-the-hooves dept.

sciencehabit (1205606) writes "Pregnant women who smoke don't just harm the health of their baby—they may actually impair their child's DNA, according to new research. A genetic analysis shows that the children of mothers who smoke harbor far more chemical modifications of their genome — known as epigenetic changes — than kids of non-smoking mothers. Many of these are on genes tied to addiction and fetal development. The finding may explain why the children of smokers continue to suffer health complications later in life.

4 of 155 comments (clear)

  1. What about... by gnu-sucks · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What about smokers who abstain from smoking during pregnancy but otherwise chain smoke through life?

    1. Re:What about... by felixrising · · Score: 2, Interesting

      There is evidence that adolescent boys who smoke, have epigenetic effects that change their sperm for the rest of their life, they produce children that are obese. http://www.reuters.com/article...

  2. 'Alter' is a neutral term. by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Perhaps there are people dumb enough to smoke while pregnant, but the alterations make their offspring less dumb. This is just a possibility. 'Alter' does not necessarily mean bad.

  3. Epigenetics by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Epigenetics also affected people in the Dutch famine of 1944 (paper, http link to paper). The children of mothers that were in the famine were smaller than average, and those children, too.