Fig. 9: Diagram summaries that maternal obesity impairs thermogenesis and energy expenditure of brown adipose tissue (BAT), predisposing female offspring to obesity and metabolic dysfunctions.
From: Imprinted lncRNA Dio3os preprograms intergenerational brown fat development and obesity resistance
Dio3os, a maternally imprinted long-coding RNA, has DNA hypermethylation in its promoter, which has an oocyte origin. The hypermethylation attributes to Dio3os inactivation in offspring BAT, which activates Dio3 and reduces thyroid hormone T3 action, leading to impaired PRDM16 activity and thermogenesis. Mouse BAT receiving AAV vector expressing Dio3os prevents MO female offspring from diet-induced obesity and glucose intolerance, providing a pharmaceutic opportunity to improve the metabolic health of offspring and intervene in a vicious maternal-daughter obesity cycle.
