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The global burden of child and youth deaths remains high, despite dramatic reductions in under-5s deaths, and there are stark inequalities across the globe in the availability of health services to children. To address this issue, a shift in societal attitudes, funding priorities, legal and regulatory frameworks, as well as technological advances, are required to support researchers. The editors at Nature Communications and Communications Medicine invite submissions of primary research papers that focus on physical and neuronal development as well as cancer and infectious diseases in childhood and adolescence. As explained in our editorial, we particularly want to encourage submissions in the areas of public health as well as studies aimed at driving equity in childhood and adolescence wellbeing and education. We will highlight relevant papers in this collection, together with other article types, such as Reviews, Perspectives, and Comments that add significant insight into the challenge of improving child and adolescent health and well-being.
Kerensky et al. quantify tension across human spinal cords in computational simulations, a cadaveric benchtop model, and a neurosurgical case series. Their direct methodology successfully differentiates stretched spinal cords from healthy states in all sub-studies.
Cheung, Zhang et al. examine the association between secondhand smoke exposure and changes in the retinal vasculature among children aged 6 to 8, in a population-based cohort study. Children exposed to secondhand smoke have wider retinal arteriolar and venular calibers compared to those in smoke-free homes.
Wen et al. investigate associations between intestinal disturbances and mortality in children hospitalized with complicated severe malnutrition. Differences are seen in the fecal metabolome of children who die compared with those who are discharged, with integrative analyses suggesting an indirect role for intestinal inflammation in mortality.
Zhong, Danielsson et al. longitudinally profile the serum proteome in a cohort of extremely preterm infants. They identify a postnatal time-dependent stereotypic pattern of development in the blood proteome from premature birth to term-equivalent age.
Zhang, Zhou et al. correlate birth weight and childhood body size with later development of chronic diseases and multimorbidity. Using data from the UK Biobank they show low or high birth weight and a body size in childhood that differs from the average associate with higher risks of developing multimorbidity and many chronic conditions in late life.
Clarke, Evangelista et al. use a knowledge graph (ReproTox-KG) to characterize associations between small molecule compounds and their potential to induce specific birth abnormalities. They identify over 500 birth defect/gene/drug connections that can explain molecular mechanisms for drug-induced birth defects.
Benefits of breastfeeding are well established, but a comprehensive study about its impacts on hospitalizations is lacking. Here, the authors use Korean nationwide birth cohort data (n = 1,608,540) and find that breastfeeding for at least 6 months was associated with a lower risk for subsequent hospital admissions.
Disruption to the brain’s oxygen supply triggers pathological dynamics and brain injuries. Here, the authors develop a model of coupled metabolic-neuronal activity that generates burst suppression patterns similar to those of infants after birth asphyxia.
Environmental exposures in early life can have lasting health effects, but the molecular mechanisms are not well understood. Here, the authors discover >1000 associations between exposure factors and child multi-omics profiles, revealing signatures for diet, toxic chemical compounds, essential trace elements, and weather conditions.
Here, by performing multi-omics microbiome analyses in a cohort of children with new-onset T1D, the authors characterize altered microbial functional and metabolic traits involved in T1D, which they validate in animal experiments, together providing potential avenues for microbiome-based interventions.
Based on preclinical studies, gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA) and immunization for the enzyme that produces GABA glutamate decarboxylase (GAD) could be a potential therapy for type 1 diabetes. Here the authors report that in a placebo-controlled, double blind trial in children with new onset type 1 diabetes oral GABA plus GAD did not preserve beta-cell function measured as fasting/meal-stimulated c-peptide levels.
Chan et al. develop an open-source smartphone-based tympanometer to evaluate middle ear function. The authors test their device in a group of paediatric patients at an audiology clinic and report a high level of agreement in audiologists’ classification of tympanograms produced using this device compared with a commercial device.
Increased droughts are associated with climate change. Here, the authors reveal an association between long-term drought and an elevated risk of diarrhea in children under five in low- and middle income countries, and suggest that improving water quality, sanitation, and hygiene practices might reduce the risk.
Helldén et al. apply the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Synergies approach to investigate interactions between SDGs and child health in Cambodia in an interdisciplinary Cambodian stakeholder group. They identify SDGs that positively influence child health and show that progress on child health also promotes the achievement of most other goals.
Airaksinen et al. describe an infant wearable system that accurately quantifies key aspects of infant motor ability and uses deep learning algorithms to analyze movement signals. Motor ability age and maturation can be predicted, with the predictions correlating with other clinical and parental assessments.
Exposure to synthetic and natural toxicants is a major risk factor in the etiology of disease. Here, authors describe the development of a method to quantify >80 xenobiotics and apply it to assess early-life exposure in vulnerable infants.
Pregnant women have been disproportionately under-vaccinated against COVID-19, partly because they were excluded from initial trials. This systematic review and meta-analysis supports efficacy of vaccination in pregnancy, and finds no evidence of adverse maternal or perinatal outcomes.
Kulvicius, Zhang et al. propose a non-invasive approach to classify infant movements using a pressure sensing device. Applying neural network architectures to pressure sensing data enables large-scale motion data acquisition and analysis.
Economic shocks may lead to food insecurity and therefore acute child malnutrition (wasting). Here, the authors use data from Demographic Health Surveys to estimate impacts of past economic shocks on wasting and project possible effects of shocks related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Better understanding of the genetic basis of acne can pave the way to more effective treatments. Here, the authors perform a genome-wide association study meta-analysis of >20,000 cases and identify 29 new acne susceptibility loci, uncovering genetic links to Mendelian hair and skin disorders and other complex traits.
Micronutrient supplements are key to global efforts to address child malnutrition. Here, in a cohort of children, previously enrolled into a large cluster randomized controlled trial of micronutrient supplementation in Pakistan, Popovic et al. find that vitamins and iron increase carriage of protozoa and fungi in the gut, potentially disrupting the bacterial microbiome.
India’s national school feeding program is the largest of its kind in the world, but the long-term program benefits on nutrition are unknown. Here, the authors show intergenerational program benefits, in that women who received free meals in primary school have children with improved linear growth.
PREGCARE is a new strategy for families who had a child with a pathogenic de novo mutation, that efficiently identifies couples at higher recurrence risk due to parental mosaicism, while reassuring many others that their recurrence risk is negligible.