The risk of overweight children becoming obese adults is nearly nine times greater than for children who are not overweight, according to a team of researchers from the Arkansas Children's Nutrition Center in Little Rock.
The new study, which appears in the online edition of the American Journal of Physiology, suggests that fetal exposure to gestational obesity leads to a self-reinforcing cycle of excessive weight gain and body fat which passes from mother to child.
The findings add to the existing body of evidence showing that both maternal obesity and genetic background influence offspring's susceptibility to obesity, the researchers said.
The study goes further to highlight that high levels of body fat occur in the offspring of obese mothers despite consuming similar calories as their lean-offspring counterparts.
