CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 3Fetal and Pediatric Neurological DisordersBirth, Development, and HealthGestational Diabetes Research and Management

Impact of High Maternal Body Mass Index on Fetal Cerebral Cortical and Cerebellar Volumes

Open access
Takeoka, Emiko, Carlson, April A., Madan, Neel, Azimirad, Afshin, Mahmoud, Taysir, Kitano, Rie, Akiyama, Shizuko, Yun, Hyuk Jin +4 more·2025·Journal of Perinatal Medicine
DOI 10.1515/jpm-2024-0222PMC PMC13379884
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

Objectives: Maternal obesity increases a child’s risk of neurodevelopmental impairment. However, little is known about the impact of maternal obesity on fetal brain development. Methods: We prospectively recruited 20 healthy pregnant women across the range of pre-pregnancy or first-trimester body mass index (BMI) and performed fetal brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of their healthy singleton fetuses. We examined correlations between early pregnancy maternal BMI and regional brain volume of living fetuses using volumetric MRI analysis. Results: Of 20 fetuses, there were 8 males and 12 females (median gestational age at MRI acquisition was 24.3 weeks, range: 19.7–33.3 weeks, median maternal age was 33.3 years, range: 22.0–37.4 years). There were no significant differences in clinical demographics between overweight (OW, 25≤BMI<30)/obese (OB, BMI≥30 kg/m 2 ) (n=12) and normal BMI (18.5≤BMI<25) (n=8) groups. Fetuses in the OW/OB group had significantly larger left cortical plate (p=0.0003), right cortical plate (p=0.0002), and whole cerebellum (p=0.049) compared to the normal BMI group. In the OW/OB BMI group, cortical plate volume was larger relative to other brain regions after 28 weeks. Conclusions: This pilot study supports the concept that maternal obesity impacts fetal brain volume, detectable via MRI in living fetuses using quantitative analysis.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1515/jpm-2024-0222

Cites

2 of 2 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 55

  1. [1]Driscoll AK, Gregory ECW. Increases in Prepregnancy Obesity: United States, 2016–2019. NCHS Data Brief. 2020(392): 1– 8. 33270551
  2. [2]Gaillard R, Steegers EA, Duijts L, Felix JF, Hofman A, Franco OH, Childhood cardiometabolic outcomes of maternal obesity during pregnancy: the Generation R Study. Hypertension. 2014; 63(4): 683– 91. 24379180
  3. [3]Alba-Linares JJ, Perez RF, Tejedor JR, Bastante-Rodriguez D, Ponce F, Carbonell NG, Maternal obesity and gestational diabetes reprogram the methylome of offspring beyond birth by inducing epigenetic signatures in metabolic and developmental pathways. Cardiovasc Diabetol. 2023; 22(1): 44. 36870961 PMC9985842
  4. [4]Rodriguez A, Miettunen J, Henriksen TB, Olsen J, Obel C, Taanila A, Maternal adiposity prior to pregnancy is associated with ADHD symptoms in offspring: evidence from three prospective pregnancy cohorts. Int J Obes (Lond). 2008; 32(3): 550– 7. 17938639
  5. [5]Chen Q, Sjolander A, Langstrom N, Rodriguez A, Serlachius E, D’Onofrio BM, Maternal pre-pregnancy body mass index and offspring attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: a population-based cohort study using a sibling-comparison design. Int J Epidemiol. 2014; 43(1): 83– 90. 24058000 PMC3937971
  6. [7]Kong L, Norstedt G, Schalling M, Gissler M, Lavebratt C. The Risk of Offspring Psychiatric Disorders in the Setting of Maternal Obesity and Diabetes. Pediatrics. 2018; 142(3). 30093539
  7. [8]Fuemmeler BF, Zucker N, Sheng Y, Sanchez CE, Maguire R, Murphy SK, Pre-Pregnancy Weight and Symptoms of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Executive Functioning Behaviors in Preschool Children. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2019; 16(4). PMC6406951 30823531
  8. [9]Dodds L, Fell DB, Shea S, Armson BA, Allen AC, Bryson S. The role of prenatal, obstetric and neonatal factors in the development of autism. J Autism Dev Disord. 2011; 41(7): 891– 902. 20922473
  9. [10]Krakowiak P, Walker CK, Bremer AA, Baker AS, Ozonoff S, Hansen RL, Maternal metabolic conditions and risk for autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. Pediatrics. 2012; 129(5): e1121– 8. 22492772 PMC3340592
  10. [11]Reynolds LC, Inder TE, Neil JJ, Pineda RG, Rogers CE. Maternal obesity and increased risk for autism and developmental delay among very preterm infants. J Perinatol. 2014; 34(9): 688– 92. 24811227 PMC4152391
  11. [12]Moss BG, Chugani DC. Increased risk of very low birth weight, rapid postnatal growth, and autism in underweight and obese mothers. Am J Health Promot. 2014; 28(3): 181– 8. 23875984
  12. [13]Pugh SJ, Hutcheon JA, Richardson GA, Brooks MM, Himes KP, Day NL, Gestational weight gain, prepregnancy body mass index and offspring attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder symptoms and behaviour at age 10. BJOG. 2016; 123(13): 2094– 103. 26996156 PMC5031500
  13. [14]Getz KD, Anderka MT, Werler MM, Jick SS. Maternal Pre-pregnancy Body Mass Index and Autism Spectrum Disorder among Offspring: A Population-Based Case-Control Study. Paediatr Perinat Epidemiol. 2016; 30(5): 479– 87. 27239935 PMC5849232
  14. [15]Li M, Fallin MD, Riley A, Landa R, Walker SO, Silverstein M, The Association of Maternal Obesity and Diabetes With Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities. Pediatrics. 2016; 137(2): e20152206. 26826214 PMC4732357
  15. [16]Varcin KJ, Newnham JP, Whitehouse AJO. Maternal pre-pregnancy weight and autistic-like traits among offspring in the general population. Autism Res. 2019; 12(1): 80– 8. 30230708
  16. [17]Windham GC, Anderson M, Lyall K, Daniels JL, Kral TVE, Croen LA, Maternal Pre-pregnancy Body Mass Index and Gestational Weight Gain in Relation to Autism Spectrum Disorder and other Developmental Disorders in Offspring. Autism Res. 2019; 12(2): 316– 27. 30575327 PMC7778460
  17. [18]Matias SL, Pearl M, Lyall K, Croen LA, Kral TVE, Fallin D, Maternal prepregnancy weight and gestational weight gain in association with autism and developmental disorders in offspring. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2021; 29(9): 1554– 64. 34347372 PMC9186321
  18. [20]Bai D, Yip BHK, Windham GC, Sourander A, Francis R, Yoffe R, Association of Genetic and Environmental Factors With Autism in a 5-Country Cohort. JAMA Psychiatry. 2019; 76(10): 1035– 43. 31314057 PMC6646998
  19. [21]Tarui T, Rasool A, O’Tierney-Ginn P. How the placenta-brain lipid axis impacts the nutritional origin of child neurodevelopmental disorders: Focus on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and autism spectrum disorder. Exp Neurol. 2021; 347: 113910. 34742689 PMC12720271
  20. [22]Chang GQ, Gaysinskaya V, Karatayev O, Leibowitz SF. Maternal high-fat diet and fetal programming: increased proliferation of hypothalamic peptide-producing neurons that increase risk for overeating and obesity. J Neurosci. 2008; 28(46): 12107– 19. 19005075 PMC2752048
  21. [23]Niculescu MD, Lupu DS. High fat diet-induced maternal obesity alters fetal hippocampal development. Int J Dev Neurosci. 2009; 27(7): 627– 33. 19695321 PMC2754591
  22. [24]Bilbo SD, Tsang V. Enduring consequences of maternal obesity for brain inflammation and behavior of offspring. FASEB J. 2010; 24(6): 2104– 15. 20124437
  23. [25]Edlow AG. Maternal obesity and neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders in offspring. Prenat Diagn. 2017; 37(1): 95– 110. 27684946 PMC5572633
  24. [26]Stachowiak EK, Srinivasan M, Stachowiak MK, Patel MS. Maternal obesity induced by a high fat diet causes altered cellular development in fetal brains suggestive of a predisposition of offspring to neurological disorders in later life. Metab Brain Dis. 2013; 28(4): 721– 5. 24043569 PMC3828054
  25. [27]Grissom NM, Herdt CT, Desilets J, Lidsky-Everson J, Reyes TM. Dissociable deficits of executive function caused by gestational adversity are linked to specific transcriptional changes in the prefrontal cortex. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2015; 40(6): 1353– 63. 25418810 PMC4397392
  26. [28]Alves JM, Luo S, Chow T, Herting M, Xiang AH, Page KA. Sex differences in the association between prenatal exposure to maternal obesity and hippocampal volume in children. Brain Behav. 2020; 10(2): e01522. 31903710 PMC7010582
  27. [29]Verdejo-Roman J, Bjornholm L, Muetzel RL, Torres-Espinola FJ, Lieslehto J, Jaddoe V, Maternal prepregnancy body mass index and offspring white matter microstructure: results from three birth cohorts. Int J Obes (Lond). 2019; 43(10): 1995– 2006. 30518826
  28. [30]Ou X, Thakali KM, Shankar K, Andres A, Badger TM. Maternal adiposity negatively influences infant brain white matter development. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2015; 23(5): 1047– 54. 25919924 PMC4414042
  29. [31]Li X, Andres A, Shankar K, Pivik RT, Glasier CM, Ramakrishnaiah RH, Differences in brain functional connectivity at resting state in neonates born to healthy obese or normal-weight mothers. Int J Obes (Lond). 2016; 40(12): 1931– 4. 27677619
  30. [32]Grossman R, Hoffman C, Mardor Y, Biegon A. Quantitative MRI measurements of human fetal brain development in utero. Neuroimage. 2006; 33(2): 463– 70. 16938471
  31. [33]Scott JA, Habas PA, Rajagopalan V, Kim K, Barkovich AJ, Glenn OA, Volumetric and surface-based 3D MRI analyses of fetal isolated mild ventriculomegaly: brain morphometry in ventriculomegaly. Brain Struct Funct. 2013; 218(3): 645– 55. 22547094
  32. [34]Keunen K, Isgum I, van Kooij BJ, Anbeek P, van Haastert IC, Koopman-Esseboom C, Brain Volumes at Term-Equivalent Age in Preterm Infants: Imaging Biomarkers for Neurodevelopmental Outcome through Early School Age. J Pediatr. 2016; 172: 88– 95. 26774198
  33. [35]Kyriakopoulou V, Vatansever D, Elkommos S, Dawson S, McGuinness A, Allsop J, Cortical overgrowth in fetuses with isolated ventriculomegaly. Cereb Cortex. 2014; 24(8): 2141– 50. 23508710
  34. [36]Ortinau CM, Mangin-Heimos K, Moen J, Alexopoulos D, Inder TE, Gholipour A, Prenatal to postnatal trajectory of brain growth in complex congenital heart disease. Neuroimage Clin. 2018; 20: 913– 22. 30308377 PMC6178192
  35. [37]Peyvandi S, Latal B, Miller SP, McQuillen PS. The neonatal brain in critical congenital heart disease: Insights and future directions. Neuroimage. 2019; 185: 776– 82. 29787864
  36. [38]Tarui T, Madan N, Farhat N, Kitano R, Ceren Tanritanir A, Graham G, Disorganized Patterns of Sulcal Position in Fetal Brains with Agenesis of Corpus Callosum. Cereb Cortex. 2018; 28(9): 3192– 203. 30124828 PMC6095213
  37. [39]Tarui T, Im K, Madan N, Madankumar R, Skotko BG, Schwartz A, Quantitative MRI Analyses of Regional Brain Growth in Living Fetuses with Down Syndrome. Cereb Cortex. 2020; 30(1): 382– 90. 31264685 PMC7029684
  38. [40]Yun HJ, Perez JDR, Sosa P, Valdes JA, Madan N, Kitano R, Regional Alterations in Cortical Sulcal Depth in Living Fetuses with Down Syndrome. Cereb Cortex. 2021; 31(2): 757– 67. 32940649 PMC7786357
  39. [41]Akiyama S, Madan N, Graham G, Samura O, Kitano R, Yun HJ, Regional brain development in fetuses with Dandy-Walker malformation: A volumetric fetal brain magnetic resonance imaging study. PLoS One. 2022; 17(2): e0263535. 35202430 PMC8870580
  40. [42]Tarui T, Madan N, Graham G, Kitano R, Akiyama S, Takeoka E, Comprehensive quantitative analyses of fetal magnetic resonance imaging in isolated cerebral ventriculomegaly. Neuroimage Clin. 2023; 37: 103357. 36878148 PMC9999203
  41. [43]Hadlock FP, Harrist RB, Martinez-Poyer J. In utero analysis of fetal growth: a sonographic weight standard. Radiology. 1991; 181(1): 129– 33. 1887021
  42. [44]Lees CC, Stampalija T, Baschat A, da Silva Costa F, Ferrazzi E, Figueras F, ISUOG Practice Guidelines: diagnosis and management of small-for-gestational-age fetus and fetal growth restriction. Ultrasound Obstet Gynecol. 2020; 56(2): 298– 312. 32738107
  43. [45]Im K, Guimaraes A, Kim Y, Cottrill E, Gagoski B, Rollins C, Quantitative Folding Pattern Analysis of Early Primary Sulci in Human Fetuses with Brain Abnormalities. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol. 2017; 38(7): 1449– 55. 28522661 PMC5509490
  44. [46]Ortinau CM, Rollins CK, Gholipour A, Yun HJ, Marshall M, Gagoski B, Early-Emerging Sulcal Patterns Are Atypical in Fetuses with Congenital Heart Disease. Cereb Cortex. 2019; 29(8): 3605– 16. 30272144 PMC6644862
  45. [47]Kuklisova-Murgasova M, Quaghebeur G, Rutherford MA, Hajnal JV, Schnabel JA. Reconstruction of fetal brain MRI with intensity matching and complete outlier removal. Med Image Anal. 2012; 16(8): 1550– 64. 22939612 PMC4067058
  46. [48]Cox RW. AFNI: what a long strange trip it’s been. Neuroimage. 2012; 62(2): 743– 7. 21889996 PMC3246532
  47. [50]Norr ME, Hect JL, Lenniger CJ, Van den Heuvel M, Thomason ME. An examination of maternal prenatal BMI and human fetal brain development. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2021; 62(4): 458– 69. 32779186 PMC7875456
  48. [51]Rodriguez A Maternal pre-pregnancy obesity and risk for inattention and negative emotionality in children. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2010; 51(2): 134– 43. 19674195
  49. [52]Van Lieshout RJ, Robinson M, Boyle MH. Maternal pre-pregnancy body mass index and internalizing and externalizing problems in offspring. Can J Psychiatry. 2013; 58(3): 151– 9. 23461886
  50. [53]Ecker C, Bookheimer SY, Murphy DGM. Neuroimaging in autism spectrum disorder: brain structure and function across the lifespan. The Lancet Neurology. 2015; 14(11): 1121– 34. 25891007
  51. [54]Severino M, Geraldo AF, Utz N, Tortora D, Pogledic I, Klonowski W, Definitions and classification of malformations of cortical development: practical guidelines. Brain. 2020; 143(10): 2874– 94. 32779696 PMC7586092
  52. [55]Nadel AS, Benacerraf BR. Lateral ventricular atrium: larger in male than female fetuses. Int J Gynaecol Obstet. 1995; 51(2): 123– 6. 8635632
  53. [56]Bromley B, Frigoletto FD Jr., Harlow BL, Evans JK, Benacerraf BR. Biometric measurements in fetuses of different race and gender. Ultrasound Obstet Gynecol. 1993; 3(6): 395– 402. 12797240
  54. [57]Gilmore JH, Lin W, Prastawa MW, Looney CB, Vetsa YS, Knickmeyer RC, Regional gray matter growth, sexual dimorphism, and cerebral asymmetry in the neonatal brain. J Neurosci. 2007; 27(6): 1255– 60. 17287499 PMC2886661
  55. [58]Tong L, Kalish BT. The impact of maternal obesity on childhood neurodevelopment. J Perinatol. 2021; 41(5): 928– 39. 33249428

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Takeoka, E., Carlson, A. A., Madan, N., Azimirad, A., Mahmoud, T., Kitano, R., Akiyama, S., Yun, H. J., Tucker, R., Im, K., O’Tierney-Ginn, P., & Tarui, T.
Affiliations
  • Tufts Medical Center (US)
  • Mass General Brigham (US)
  • Boston Children's Hospital (US)
  • Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island (US)
Corresponding author
Tarui, Tomo
ORCID
Venue
Journal of Perinatal Medicine
Publisher
Walter de Gruyter GmbH
Published
2025-01-06
Volume
53
Issue
3
Pages
376-386
ISSN
  • 0300-5577 (ISSN-L)
  • 1619-3997
DOI
10.1515/jpm-2024-0222
PMC
PMC13379884
OpenAlex
W4406045480
Cited by
3
References
2
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 1
FWCI
4.57
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Journal of Perinatal Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
  • Susan Saltonstall Foundation
  • National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (Tufts Clinical Translational Science Institute)
  • National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (K23HD079605)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pediatrics, Perinatology and Child Health › Fetal and Pediatric Neurological Disorders
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pediatrics, Perinatology and Child Health › Birth, Development, and Health
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Obstetrics and Gynecology › Gestational Diabetes Research and Management
Keywords
maternal obesity, maternal body mass index, fetal brain development, fetal brain volume, cerebral cortex, cerebellum, cortical plate, prenatal MRI
MeSH terms
Pregnancy in Obesity, Adult, Cerebellum, Cerebral Cortex, Female, Gestational Age, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Organ Size, Pregnancy, Prospective Studies, Body Mass Index, Fetal Development, Young Adult

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review