The purpose of the project is to determine the relationship of early development to later risk of metabolic disease. Measures of a number of early influences are available including 1) linear growth, gestational age and birth weight (available from either chart review or birth certificate information), 2) parental factors potentially influencing early development including maternal and paternal metabolic data, family size and birth order (available from the biennial survey). Long term follow up data are available on offspring, again from the biennial survey. Current work includes: i) the influence of maternal diabetes on later risk of metabolic disease in her offspring. ii) examination of the role of genetic factors in the """"""""birth weight hypothesis"""""""", in particular the role of paternal diabetes in low birth weight and potential influence of imprinting effects (by means of modification of the existing genome wide scan) on diabetes, obesity, and early growth.
