The effect of maternal diet on maternal and fetal hepatic and brown adipose tissue lipogenesis and blood and tissue metabolites

: Both starvation of and feeding a high linoleic acid content diet to rats during late pregnancy resulted in (relative to stock diet fed controls) a decrease in maternal hepatic glycogen content and lipogenesis, reduced blood glucose levels and an increase in blood ketone levels whereas only fat feeding caused an increase in blood triglyceride levels and only starvation resulted in a decrease in the amount of brown adipose tissue. Maternal starvation resulted in decreased fetal body, liver and brown adipose tissue weights, diminished liver and brown adipose glycogen content and lipogenesis and lowered blood glucose levels. Both maternal fat feeding and starvation caused triglyceride accumulation in fetal liver, elevated blood ketone levels and an increased proportion of fetal liver and carcass fatty acids accounted for by linoleic acid.