As we know, the placenta is a fundamental organ during pregnancy, since it is the one that ensures that nutrients and oxygen reach the baby. In addition, it works as a filter to remove baby's wastes and also manufactures hormones such as human chorionic gonadotropin, which is what allows pregnancy to move forward.
Now, a new study has found that the placenta has another very important and special capacity, since they discovered that can be adapted to protect the baby when the mother has a poor diet or lack of oxygen during pregnancy.
Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), the study conducted by researchers at the University of Cambridge found that When it comes to difficult pregnancies, the placenta can regulate the amount of oxygen and nutrients that reach the baby.
In Babies and more A group of scientists develops mini-placentas to study the early stages of pregnancyIn it, they could see that Mitochondria in the placenta can adapt their use of oxygen and nutrients to support the growth and functions of the placenta, as well as protect the development of the baby, both in normal pregnancies, and in those who are in difficult conditions or situations.
For this study, mice were used to model the conditions inside the uterus, and analyze with different tests how the placenta and its mitochondria reacted of these, which is very similar to the human in development and functioning, and review the impact this had on the growth of the fetus.
According to the researchers, this new information is important, because It helps to better understand the mechanism of human pregnancy, especially in those in which fetal growth is compromised by environmental issues, such as living in places with a lot of height or that the mother has a healthy diet.
