Findings of a new study recently demonstrated a multifaceted interplay between vitamin D and the placenta and could help inform future interferences using vitamin D to support the development of the fetus and maternal adaptations to pregnancy.
A EurekAlert! report specified that scientists had shed new light on the function of the placenta in managing the relationships between maternal vitamin D and fetal development.
Since a fetus cannot produce vitamin D, it must be transferred through the placenta. This is essential for both fetal and lifelong health. Maternal vitamin D concentrations are favorably linked to fetal bone growth and birth weight, and such links continue into postnatal life.
Role of Placenta in the Delivery of Vitamin D
Previous research has proposed that maternal vitamin D transfers passively across the placenta, although the present study published in the ELife journal, challenges this notion.
According to Dr. Claire Simner, Research Assistant at the University of Southampton, United Kingdom, research in kidneys has questioned the function of passive diffusion in the acceptance of vitamin D.
It has rather revealed that such uptake is driven mainly by endocytosis of vitamin D, where the vitamin is bound to the binding protein albumin and "introduced into the organ tissue cells," explained Simner.
Simner is the study's co-first author alongside Dr. Brogan Ashley, who was at the University of Southampton, too, when the research was conducted.
Explaining their work, the co-first author said they proposed a similar endocytic mechanism in the placenta, suggesting that the organ is playing an active role in the delivery of vitamin D to the fetus.
Quantitative rtPCR Technique
To further explore the idea, the researchers designed research to determine how maternal vitamin D is taken up, metabolized, and facilitates gene expression within the human placenta.
They employed a perfusion model involving the utilization of human placenta specimens collected from term pregnancies instantly after delivery and placental fragment cultures to examine the organ tissue's behavior.
These approaches contrast with cell-model methods of past research into how vitamin D is transferring through the placenta.
To identify the mechanisms of placental vitamin D update, the researchers incubated fresh term human placental fragments with vitamin D together with albumin for eight hours.
Then, according to a similar Medical Xpress report, they examined the fragments' gene expression using a technique known as quantitative rtPCR.
Their analysis showed a substantial release in the expression of the CYP24A1 gene, which regulates the amount of vitamin D in the body, in the fragments after incubation, compared to fragments that were incubated with the said vitamin only. As a result, it suggests that albumin might allow vitamin D update.
'Endocytosis'
Lecturer in Epidemics, Dr. Jane Cleal from the University of Southampton and co-senior author of the study together with Professor Nicholas Harvey, Professor of Rheumatology and Clinical Epidemiology at the MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Centre, University of Southampton, such findings reveal that "endocytosis may play a vital role" in the acceptance of vitamin D into the human placenta, as formerly observed in kidneys.
Moreover, the team validated that exposure to vitamin D leads to rapid effects on the complete set of messenger RNA molecules and proteins expressed by the placenta.
Such findings showed that the fundamental epigenetic landscape of the placenta, the interaction between the environment and the genes, helps to dictate this transcriptional reaction to vitamin D treatment.
Related information about the placenta plays during pregnancy is shown on Parentalogic's YouTube video below:
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