FiberNEW2026

The effects of maternal dietary fiber and short-chain fatty acids on the health of offspring: a mini review.

Liu Shaozhi, Feng Senling, Yuan Zhongwen, Mei Zhengrong et al. — Frontiers in nutrition

Summary

This review explores how a mother's fiber intake during pregnancy can influence her child's long-term health. When mothers eat fiber, their gut bacteria produce beneficial compounds called short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), which appear to play a crucial role in shaping the baby's metabolism and immune system. Evidence suggests that adequate maternal fiber may help protect offspring from issues like obesity and inflammation.

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Key points

A mother's diet during pregnancy, especially fiber intake, can significantly impact her child's long-term health.
Dietary fiber is broken down by gut bacteria into beneficial compounds called short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs).
These SCFAs play a key role in developing the baby's metabolism and immune system.
Ensuring enough fiber during pregnancy may help protect children from future health problems like obesity and inflammation.

What the study looked at

This mini-review aimed to understand how a mother's dietary fiber intake and the short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) produced from it affect her child's health outcomes. It's a "mini-review," meaning the authors synthesized existing research. They looked at various types of studies, including molecular-level investigations, experiments with animals, and observational studies involving human mothers and their children. This approach allowed them to gather evidence from different angles to build a comprehensive picture. The review found consistent evidence suggesting that maternal fiber intake is crucial. In animal studies, a lack of fiber in the mother's diet led to problems in offspring, such as impaired glucose control, increased inflammation, and a higher risk of obesity. Conversely, supplementing with fiber or SCFAs showed protective effects. Human studies also indicated a link between a mother's SCFA levels and positive outcomes for babies, including better metabolic profiles and reduced obesity risk, though more randomized controlled trials are needed to confirm these associations definitively. The SCFAs appear to work by influencing cell signaling and long-term gene regulation.

Dietary takeaway

This review highlights the potential importance of dietary fiber for pregnant individuals, suggesting it could positively influence their child's long-term health. While more research is always ongoing, incorporating a variety of fiber-rich foods like fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes into the diet during pregnancy is a sensible and generally healthy choice. Remember, this is one review of existing studies, and individual dietary needs should always be discussed with a healthcare provider.

Abstract

Maternal nutrition during pregnancy is a critical determinant of offspring long-term health. Dietary fiber has emerged as a key modifiable factor. Through gut microbial fermentation, fiber is converted into short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), primarily acetate, propionate, and butyrate. This mini review synthesizes current evidence from molecular, animal, and human studies on the role of maternal SCFAs in programming offspring metabolic and immune health. Mechanistically, SCFAs act via two complementary pathways: activation of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) and inhibition of histone deacetylases, leading to rapid signaling and long-term epigenetic regulation. Animal studies demonstrate that maternal fiber deprivation impairs offspring glucose metabolism, promotes low-grade inflammation and obesity, and compromises immune tolerance, whereas fiber or short-chain fatty acid (SCFA) supplementation confers protective effects. Human observational studies support these findings, showing associations between maternal SCFA levels and favorable neonatal metabolic profiles, neurodevelopmental outcomes, and reduced obesity risk, although randomized controlled trials remain limited. Key translational challenges include inter-species differences, individual microbiome variability, and optimal intervention timing. Despite these uncertainties, promoting adequate and diverse dietary fiber intake during pregnancy represents a safe, low-cost, and scalable public health strategy to improve intergenerational health outcomes.

View on PubMed →DOI: 10.3389/fnut.2026.1867014