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Researchers at the University of Zurich have found that trauma in early life affects not only psychological but also physical health in adulthood across generations.
“Our results show that trauma in early life affects not only psychological but also physical health in adulthood across generations, for example lipid metabolism and sugar balance,” says one study author.
(sda) Children of traumatized people often suffer from illness. It depends on parenting, as a layman thinks. Zurich neuroscientists have now discovered that traumatized people transmit health problems to their children through their blood.
Using the mouse model, a team from the University of Zurich Brain Research Institute (UZH) showed that early traumatic experiences had an effect on the composition of the blood. They found numerous significant differences between the blood of traumatized animals and a normally raised control group.
The changes in lipid metabolism were particularly notable. And these were also found in the offspring of the animals in question. As a result, their offspring also developed symptoms of the trauma – “impressive evidence that blood transmits messages of stress to germ cells,” a UZH statement said Friday.
Mouse model confirmed in human children
The researchers then examined whether there are similar effects in humans: to do this, in an SOS Children’s Village in Pakistan they analyzed the blood and saliva of 25 children whose fathers had died and who grew up separated from their mothers. Compared with children from intact families, several factors of fat metabolism were also increased in these orphans.
“The traumatic experiences of these children can be compared very well with our mouse model and their metabolism shows similar blood changes,” says Isabelle Mansuy, professor of neuroepigenetics at the Brain Research Institute of the University of Zurich and the Institute for Neuroscience of the ETH in Zurich.
“This illustrates how important laboratory animal research is in gaining fundamental knowledge about human health.” Up to a quarter of children worldwide suffer violence, abuse and neglect, which can lead to illness in old age.
Sperm transmission
In additional experiments, the team discovered a molecular mechanism by which factors involved in lipid metabolism transmit signals to germ cells. The so-called PPAR receptor on the cell surface plays a key role here: it is activated by fatty acids and regulates gene expression and DNA structure in many tissues. It turned out that this receptor is up-regulated in the sperm of the traumatized mice.
Artificial activation of the receptor also led to lower body weights and disturbances in sugar metabolism in male mice and their offspring. From these and other experiments, the researchers conclude that activation of the PPAR receptor in sperm caused by fatty acids plays an important role in the inheritance of the metabolic effects caused by trauma.
Trauma damages offspring’s health
“Our results show that trauma in early life affects not only psychological but also physical health in adulthood across generations, for example, fat metabolism and sugar balance,” says Mansuy. “This is rarely taken into account in the clinic.”
Therefore, a better understanding of the biological processes behind it could help in the future to prevent the subsequent consequences of trauma through preventive medical care.
