Longevity determined by paternal ancestors' nutrition during their slow growth period

Social circumstances often impinge on later generations in a socio-economic manner, giving children an uneven start in life. Overfeeding and overeatin g might not be an exception. The pathways might be complex but one direct m echanism could be genomic imprinting and loss of imprinting. An intergenera tional "feedforward" control loop has been proposed, that links grandparent al nutrition with the grandchild's growth. The mechanism has been speculate d to be a specific response, e.g. to their nutritional state, directly modi fying the setting of the gametic imprint on one or more genes. This study r aises the question: Can overnutrition during a child's slow growth period t rigger such direct mechanisms and partly determine mortality? Data were collected by following-up a cohort born in 1905 in Overkalix pari sh, northernmost Sweden. The probands were characterised by their parents' or grandparents' access to food during their own slow growth period. Availa bility of food in the area was defined by referring to historical data on h arvests and food prices, records of local community meetings and general hi storical facts. If there was a surfeit of food in the environment when the paternal grandfa ther was a 9-12 year old boy a shortening of the proband survival could be demonstrated. The influence of parents', maternal grandparents' and paterna l grandmothers' access to food during their slow growth period was discount ed in a multivariable analysis. The results are indicative of very early pr ogramming mechanisms in human adaptation to the social environment.