FIG. 1.

Maternal HF diet intake resulted in decreased number of oocytes in fetal ovaries at E20. Representative photomicrographs show fetal offspring ovaries from dams fed CON (a) and HF (b). Bars = 100 μm. c) Maternal HF diet during pregnancy resulted in an 11% decrease in the number of oocytes at E20 in fetal offspring ovaries (n = 8, CON; n = 5, HF). Maternal retroperitoneal fat mass (d) and maternal plasma leptin concentrations (e) negatively correlated (r = −0.57; P < 0.05; r = −0.63; P < 0.05, respectively) with the number of oocytes in fetal offspring ovaries. Solid line is the best fit, and dotted lines are 95% confidence intervals. f) Maternal HF diet during pregnancy resulted in significant increase in activated caspase-3 immunostaining, expressed as a proportion of positive immunostaining per total area analyzed (n = 5 CON; n = 5 HF). Data are mean ± SEM fold changes relative to CON offspring for oocyte counts. Student unpaired t-test, **P < 0.01; ***P < 0.001.