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Articles

Prenatal Undernutrition and Postnatal Growth Are Associated with Adolescent Thymic Function¹

Thomas W. McDade^*2, Melinda A. Beck^,**, Christopher W. Kuzawa and Linda S. Adair^**,

^* Department of Anthropology, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208-1310; Departments of Pediatrics and ^** Nutrition and Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC; and Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA

²To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: t-mcdade{at}northwestern.edu.

The fetal and early infant origins of a number of adult cardiovascular and metabolic diseases have received considerable attention, but the long-term consequences of early environments for human immune function have not been reported. We investigated the effects of pre- and postnatal environments on thymic hormone production in adolescents participating in an ongoing longitudinal study in the Philippines. Prospective data collected at birth, during y 1 of life, in childhood and in adolescence were used to predict plasma thymopoietin concentration in 14- to 15-y-old adolescents (n = 103). Thymopoietin concentration was compared for small-for-gestational-age and appropriate-for-gestational-age individuals while controlling for a range of postnatal exposures. Prenatal undernutrition was significantly associated with reduced thymopoietin production in interaction with the duration of exclusive breast-feeding (P = 0.006). Growth in length during y 1 of life was positively associated with adolescent thymopoietin production (P = 0.002). These associations remained significant after adjusting for a range of potentially confounding variables. These findings provide support for the importance of fetal and early infant programming of thymic function, and suggest that early environments may have long-term implications for immunocompetence and adult disease risk.

KEY WORDS: • thymic factor • immune system • prenatal exposure delayed effects • growth and development • nutrition • humans

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