Maternal Obesity and Offspring Neurodevelopment

Our goals are to characterize the effects of maternal obesity during pregnancy on infant brain development, reveal the neurodevelopmental consequences, and identify possible mechanisms causing these effects. Our overall hypothesis is that maternal obesity during pregnancy exposes the fetus to an inflammatory environment that affects infant brain structural and functional development and consequently neurodevelopmental outcomes. To test this hypothesis, the investigators will recruit normal-weight and obese pregnant women, examine inflammatory markers associated with obese pregnancy, and correlate them with offspring's brain development evaluated using quantitative MRI methods and outcomes evaluated using neurodevelopmental tests.