许多植物和动物以不同质量的方式进行发育，这取决于它们从其早期生活的环境中所接收到的提示信息。它们的成年形式和行为适应由沿某一特定渠道传递下来的信息所预测的条件。有时这种预测是错误的。Bateson等人将这一模型应用于人类健康史研究，发现出生时身材小、完全适应一种节俭环境的人，如果他们在一种富裕环境中长大的话，日后尤其可能患肥胖症和心脏病等疾病。如果这种解释是正确的话，那么它对公共卫生的意义将是值得考虑的。通过了解其中所涉及的生物学问题，将有可能研究出干预措施，从而在儿童时代促进健康的同时又不会影响日后的健康。
Nature 430, 419 - 421 (22 July 2004); doi:10.1038/nature02725
Developmental plasticity and human health
Many plants and animals are capable of developing in a variety of ways, forming characteristics that are well adapted to the environments in which they are likely to live. In adverse circumstances, for example, small size and slow metabolism can facilitate survival, whereas larger size and more rapid metabolism have advantages for reproductive success when resources are more abundant. Often these characteristics are induced in early life or are even set by cues to which their parents or grandparents were exposed. Individuals developmentally adapted to one environment may, however, be at risk when exposed to another when they are older. The biological evidence may be relevant to the understanding of human development and susceptibility to disease. As the nutritional state of many human mothers has improved around the world, the characteristics of their offspring—such as body size and metabolism—have also changed. Responsiveness to their mothers' condition before birth may generally prepare individuals so that they are best suited to the environment forecast by cues available in early life. Paradoxically, however, rapid improvements in nutrition and other environmental conditions may have damaging effects on the health of those people whose parents and grandparents lived in impoverished conditions. A fuller understanding of patterns of human plasticity in response to early nutrition and other environmental factors will have implications for the administration of public health.
全文下载：
