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Childhood growth and neurocognition are associated with distinct sets of metabolites

G Brett Moreau1, Girija Ramakrishnan1, Heather L Cook2

  • 1Division of Infectious Diseases and International Health, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA.

Ebiomedicine
|May 29, 2019
PubMed

Insights

Childhood undernutrition impacts development. Metabolite analysis reveals distinct early-life biomarkers for growth and later neurocognitive outcomes, suggesting targeted interventions are needed.

Area of Science:

  • Nutritional science
  • Developmental pediatrics
  • Metabolomics

Background:

  • Undernutrition is a global health issue affecting child development and long-term outcomes.
  • Current interventions for undernutrition have limited effectiveness.
  • Identifying metabolic pathways offers potential for novel intervention strategies.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the associations between specific metabolites and child growth and neurocognitive development.
  • To identify early-life metabolic biomarkers predictive of developmental trajectories.

Main Methods:

  • Targeted metabolomic analysis of plasma samples from 130 children at 9 and 36 months.
  • Assessed bile acids, acylcarnitines, amino acids, phosphatidylcholines, and sphingomyelins.
  • Utilized correlation, penalized-linear regression, and random forest modeling to link metabolites with growth and neurocognitive outcomes at age four.

Main Results:

  • Distinct metabolite profiles were associated with growth and neurocognitive outcomes.
  • Improved growth correlated with higher hydroxy-sphingomyelin and essential amino acids, and lower acylcarnitines and bile acid conjugates.
  • Neurocognitive scores were linked to phosphatidylcholine species and early inflammation markers, collectively explaining ~45% of outcome variation.

Conclusions:

  • Early-life metabolites (9 months) predict growth, reflecting diet, enteric dysfunction, and microbiome status.
  • Hydroxy-sphingomyelin is a key predictor of improved growth.
  • Later metabolites (36 months) and inflammatory markers are associated with neurodevelopment, suggesting distinct metabolic targets for interventions.
Abstract

Keywords:
ChildhoodMetabolomicsNeurocognitionPhosphatidylcholineSphingomyelinStunting

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