The Ramazzini Institute
for Occupational and Environmental Health Research   

Who Are We?

Human Ecology
Did Our Ancestors Imprint Life Style?

     Can our lifestyle imprint our genes? Patients with stroke, heart disease and diabetes may have been affected by their ancestors' overeating, according to a study in the November 2002 issue of the European Journal of Human Genetics, by Gunnar Kaati and co-investigators at the University of Umeå, Sweden.
      The study shows that individuals whose paternal grandfathers had surplus food during one period of their childhood suffered increased death rates in these diseases. Childhood overeating, during the pre-pubescent "slow-growth period", may influence descendants' risk of death from cardiovascular disease and diabetes.
     When the father and the paternal grandmother were exposed to a famine during their slow growth period the child or grandchild tended to be protected against death due to cardiovascular disease. The experience of a paternal grandfather living through a famine during his slow growth period could result in fewer grandchildren with diabetes.
     The investigators found that if the paternal grandfathers had access to surplus food during their slow growth period, their grandchildren were four times more likely to die of diabetes.
     Overfeeding and overeating in families are habits that may be often transferred from generation to generation. Family eating lifestyle culturally transmitted might lead to inherited [sperm-mediated] adaptive changes. The study encourages exploration of nutrition and other habits imprinted in the genome.