Calibrating the next generation: Mothers, early life experiences, and reproductive development

In the spirit of illuminating the invisible, this chapter examines how early life experiences shape a biological sensitivity to context. The biological embedding of early life experiences is an exciting new area of research that lends itself to integrated systems thinking. Indeed, this body of research demands an integration of social inequality, ecological theory, and the cellular unfolding of development from conception to old age. The emphasis for this chapter is the role of early life experiences, particularly undernutrition and stress, in guiding the development of reproductive function. This chapter pulls together these data to examine the bridge to global public health by briefly reviewing some promising new research that documents how economic and dietary transitions across the globe shape early life biology.