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BackgroundDNA methylation (DNAm) may play an important role in birth outcomes.Material and MethodsGenome wide DNAm was analysed in peripheral blood DNA of women at multiple time points during gestation. A novel empirical method was used to identify CpG sites with high temporal variance in methylation associating with preterm birth.ResultsHigh variability at 1296 CpG sites from the promoter regions of 1197 genes significantly associated with PTB. These genes belonged to pathways involved in signalling by platelet derived growth factor, platelet homeostasis, collagen degradation, extracellular matrix and circadian clock.ConclusionsThe findings provide novel information which might help in development of predictive biomarkers of preterm birth outcome.

BackgroundDevelopment of methods to detect risk of preterm birth in pregnant women can result in reduction in occurrence of preterm birth. Our objective was to undertake a longitudinal study to investigate the association of telomere length shortening in peripheral blood DNA of women during pregnancy with preterm birth.MethodsTelomere length reduction in peripheral blood DNA was measured at two time points by Real Time PCR in pregnant women enrolled in a large prospective cohort (GARBH-Ini) in Gurugram, India. Out of 248 women who participated in this study, 60 mothers delivered preterm while 188 mothers delivered at term. ResultsTelomere length was found to be significantly reduced in preterm birth delivering mothers compared to those who delivered at term at less than 20 weeks (p=0.02) and at 26-28 weeks (p=0.84 x 10-15) of pregnancy. Predictive modelling by binary logistic regression analysis revealed that reduction of telomere length (T/S ratio) at 26-28 weeks was found to be significantly (p=7.7181 x 10-06) associated with enhanced risk of preterm birth. A mean odds ratio of 8.4 was found for association of T/S ratio with preterm birth outcome. There was no significant difference in maternal age between the mothers who delivered preterm and those who delivered at term. ConclusionsOur preliminary results indicate that telomere length reduction in maternal peripheral blood DNA might be a potential indicator of risk of preterm delivery.