Maternal-diabetes induced gene expression changes in the umbilical cord

Analysis of umbilical cord tissue in newborns of type 1 diabetic mothers at gene expression level. The hypothesis tested in the present study was that intrauterine diabetic milieu may effect of fetal umbilical cord gene expression, and via umbilical cord, the alterations may be produced in other fetal tissues as well. Results provide an information of the differentially expressed genes and enriched pathways, such as the dowregulated genes on the pathway on blood vessel development in umbilical cords from diabetic pregnancies. Umbilical cord tissue was collected after elective ceasarean section and was immediately flash frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at -80C until total RNA extraction from the whole tissue sample. Six cords exposed to maternal diabetes (DM) and six control cords (C) from healthy pregnancies were analyzed.