Our weight is governed by our lifestyle and our genes. But new research at Linköping University has shown that the lifestyle of parents – before children are conceived – appears to impact their offspring’s weight.
Anita Öst of Linköping University has shown that if male fruit flies eat large quantities of sugar, they have fatter offspring. Now she wants to figure out exactly which molecules in fly sperm have this effect, and whether humans work the same way.
Since more people die of obesity-related diseases today than famine, is it important to understand the mechanisms that govern metabolism.