According to Yale University researchers, developmental abnormalities, including those that lead to pregnancy loss and autism, are controlled by the genetics of the fetus and placenta and not the mother's intrauterine environment.
"Mothers often feel that they are responsible for these defects. But it's not their fault," said Harvey Kliman, senior author of the paper published in Placenta recently. "This new research points to the genetics of these children as being the most important cause."
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For the study, Kliman's team examined placental data for nearly 50 sets of identical and non-identical twins. The researchers found that abnormal cell growths called trophoblast inclusions (TIs) which are markers for many developmental abnormalities, occurred with similar frequency in identical twins, while non-identical twins showed a markedly different TI count.
Identical twins share the same DNA sequence; non-identical twins share half of their DNA sequence. The researchers found that identical twins often had the same number of TIs or were within one of having the same TI count. Non-identical twins had TI counts that were, on average, different by four or five.