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. 2020 Sep 17;12(9):2849.
doi: 10.3390/nu12092849.

Association of Maternal Plasma Total Cysteine and Growth among Infants in Nepal: A Cohort Study

Nikhil Arora  1 , Tor A Strand  2   3 , Ram K Chandyo  4 , Amany Elshorbagy  5   6 , Laxman Shrestha  7 , Per M Ueland  8 , Manjeswori Ulak  2   7 , Catherine Schwinger  2
Affiliations

Association of Maternal Plasma Total Cysteine and Growth among Infants in Nepal: A Cohort Study

Nikhil Arora et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Cysteine is a semi-essential amino acid that has been positively associated with growth in children. However, transgenerational effects remain unclear. The aim of this analysis was to assess whether maternal plasma total cysteine (tCys) concentration is associated with various growth indicators in infants living in peri-urban settings in Bhaktapur, Nepal. We used data from the 561 mothers enrolled in an ongoing randomized controlled trial. We built linear regression models to evaluate the associations between maternal tCys and birth weight, length-for-age Z-scores (LAZ) and weight-for-length Z-scores (WLZ) at birth and six months of age. Maternal tCys was inversely associated with birth weight among boys after adjusting for confounders (p < 0.05). In addition, there was a negative association between maternal tCys and LAZ at birth (p < 0.01). No associations between maternal tCys and the other anthropometric indicators were found significant, although there was a tendency for maternal tCys to be associated positively with WLZ at birth among girls (p < 0.10). This is a first study evaluating transgenerational relation of tCys on growth in infants. Further, larger and more comprehensive studies are needed to determine if and how maternal tCys alters child growth.

Keywords: Asia; amino acid; child; length; malnutrition; metabolism; stunting; tCys; wasting; weight.

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Conflict of interest statement

All authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Generalized additive model (GAM) plots showing: the relation of maternal plasma total cysteine (tCys) concentration with birth weight (in grams) among boys (a) and girls (b); length-for-age Z-score (LAZ) at birth (c); weight-for-length Z-score (WLZ) at birth (d); LAZ score at six months of age (e); and WLZ score at six months of age (f) after adjusting for confounders included in the regression models and excluding values <2.5th percentile and ≥97.5th percentile for maternal tCys. Y-axes values for all the growth indicators are centered around their respective median.
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