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Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Urlacher, SS; Ellison, PT; Sugiyama, LS; Pontzer, H; Eick, G; Liebert, MA; Cepon-Robins, TJ; Gildner, TE; Snodgrass, JJ
Published in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
April 2018

Immune function is an energetically costly physiological activity that potentially diverts calories away from less immediately essential life tasks. Among developing organisms, the allocation of energy toward immune function may lead to tradeoffs with physical growth, particularly in high-pathogen, low-resource environments. The present study tests this hypothesis across diverse timeframes, branches of immunity, and conditions of energy availability among humans. Using a prospective mixed-longitudinal design, we collected anthropometric and blood immune biomarker data from 261 Amazonian forager-horticulturalist Shuar children (age 4-11 y old). This strategy provided baseline measures of participant stature, s.c. body fat, and humoral and cell-mediated immune activity as well as subsample longitudinal measures of linear growth (1 wk, 3 mo, 20 mo) and acute inflammation. Multilevel analyses demonstrate consistent negative effects of immune function on growth, with children experiencing up to 49% growth reduction during periods of mildly elevated immune activity. The direct energetic nature of these relationships is indicated by (i) the manifestation of biomarker-specific negative immune effects only when examining growth over timeframes capturing active competition for energetic resources, (ii) the exaggerated impact of particularly costly inflammation on growth, and (iii) the ability of children with greater levels of body fat (i.e., energy reserves) to completely avoid the growth-inhibiting effects of acute inflammation. These findings provide evidence for immunologically and temporally diverse body fat-dependent tradeoffs between immune function and growth during childhood. We discuss the implications of this work for understanding human developmental energetics and the biological mechanisms regulating variation in human ontogeny, life history, and health.

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Published In

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

DOI

EISSN

1091-6490

ISSN

0027-8424

Publication Date

April 2018

Volume

115

Issue

17

Start / End Page

E3914 / E3921

Related Subject Headings

  • Prospective Studies
  • Male
  • Immunity, Humoral
  • Immunity, Cellular
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Ecuador
  • Child, Preschool
  • Child Development
  • Child
 

Citation

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Urlacher, S. S., Ellison, P. T., Sugiyama, L. S., Pontzer, H., Eick, G., Liebert, M. A., … Snodgrass, J. J. (2018). Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 115(17), E3914–E3921. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1717522115
Urlacher, Samuel S., Peter T. Ellison, Lawrence S. Sugiyama, Herman Pontzer, Geeta Eick, Melissa A. Liebert, Tara J. Cepon-Robins, Theresa E. Gildner, and J Josh Snodgrass. “Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 115, no. 17 (April 2018): E3914–21. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1717522115.
Urlacher SS, Ellison PT, Sugiyama LS, Pontzer H, Eick G, Liebert MA, et al. Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2018 Apr;115(17):E3914–21.
Urlacher, Samuel S., et al. “Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, vol. 115, no. 17, Apr. 2018, pp. E3914–21. Epmc, doi:10.1073/pnas.1717522115.
Urlacher SS, Ellison PT, Sugiyama LS, Pontzer H, Eick G, Liebert MA, Cepon-Robins TJ, Gildner TE, Snodgrass JJ. Tradeoffs between immune function and childhood growth among Amazonian forager-horticulturalists. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2018 Apr;115(17):E3914–E3921.
Journal cover image

Published In

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

DOI

EISSN

1091-6490

ISSN

0027-8424

Publication Date

April 2018

Volume

115

Issue

17

Start / End Page

E3914 / E3921

Related Subject Headings

  • Prospective Studies
  • Male
  • Immunity, Humoral
  • Immunity, Cellular
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Ecuador
  • Child, Preschool
  • Child Development
  • Child