Weekly exercise by pregnant moms boost babies' brains

A new study has suggested when to-be-moms exercised for three 20-minute sessions a week, their babies? brains showed more mature patterns of activity.

A new study has suggested when to-be-moms exercised for three 20-minute sessions a week, their babies' brains showed more mature patterns of activity.

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The findings have come from a randomised controlled trial in humans to show that a pregnant mother's exercise routine can impact her baby's brain. Elise Labonte-LeMoyne at the University of Montreal, said that mother's exercise also impacts their kid' weight gain in life, the Guardian reported.

Women joined the research group in their first trimester and were randomly assigned to an exercise or a sedentary control group.

The 10 women in the exercise group cycled, walked, ran or swam for three short sessions a week. The eight women in other group were instructed not to exercise.

Eight to 12 days after babies were born, the researchers measured their brain activity.

They used a hairnet of 124 electrodes, and recorded electroencephalograms (EEG) while they played sleeping babies a series of beeps that were interspersed with different sounds.

Even though they were asleep, brain activity patterns showed how efficiently they were able to discriminate between old and novel sounds.