Long-term brain and behavioral consequences of early-life iron deficiency

Early-life iron deficiency anemia affects 30-50 % of pregnancies worldwide and causes deficits in cognitive development as well as socio-emotional abnormalities. More concerning, these deficits persist into adulthood, including increased risks of schizophrenia and depression, despite prompt iron repletion during childhood. Emerging evidence implicates long-term changes in the neural metabolome, proteome, and genome as potential biological bases underlying these effects. In turn, better knowledge of the underlying biology will lead to new methods of identifying young children at risk for brain iron deficiency and adjunct or rescue therapies designed to optimize their outcomes.