Activation of the sympathetic nervous system, is it key to the developmental origins of enhanced cardiovascular risk?

proposes that undernutrition during fetal life slows fetal growth programming an increase in risk factors for cardiovascular disease (10). Numerous experimental models of undernutrition induced by protein restriction during gestation or placental insufficiency provide proof of principal for this concept (10). Yet, recent experimental studies report that environmental influences during early postnatal life can also impact later cardiovascular risk in the absence of slow fetal growth (5). Experimental studies utilizing different methods of develop-mental insult are demonstrating that common cardiovascular outcomes are observed despite the timing or method of devel-opmental insult (5, 10). Importantly, these studies are provid-ing insight into the mechanistic pathways implicated in the etiology of programmed cardiovascular risk. Factors that alter the ability of the kidney to regulate bod