Maternal exercise alters placental proteome in an exercise mode-specific manner

Maternal exercise is a widely recommended and safe intervention associated with the improvement of maternal gestational and infant metabolic health. Although various modes of exercise are deemed safe during pregnancy, the effects of supervised maternal aerobic, resistance, and combination (aerobic + resistance) exercise remain understudied. Specifically, it remains unknown how different modes of maternal exercise affect the placenta, an organ central to maternal-fetal communication and successful pregnancy outcomes. This study aimed to characterize the placental proteomic changes in response to controlled and supervised maternal exercise during gestation. Results demonstrate that the placental proteomic landscape changes in a maternal exercise mode-specific way. In addition, proteomics revealed that ∼20% of the identified placental proteins were associated with maternal exercise volume during gestation. These results highlight the differential effect maternal exercise modes have on the placental proteome and further implicate the placenta in mediating the effects of maternal exercise on maternal and infant health. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03838146 and NCT04805502.NEW & NOTEWORTHY This article highlights the broad and significant changes that occur in the placental proteome in response to different types of maternal exercise. Our findings further reveal that the overall volume of maternal exercise was associated with alterations in nearly 25% of the identified placental proteins, suggesting that both the type and amount of maternal physical activity may play important roles in shaping placental function and possibly contributing to fetal development.