# Stress and Racial Disparities in Preeclampsia -  Clues from DNA Methylomic Profiling

> **NIH NIH U01** · RESEARCH TRIANGLE INSTITUTE · 2021 · $219,657

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
Despite being one of the wealthiest developed nations, maternal mortality is on the rise in the
U.S., almost doubling in the last thirty years. Racial disparities in maternal mortality have also
widened, with Black maternal mortality more than three times that for White individuals. Studies
exploring the social determinants of health have consistently identified inadequate prenatal
care, poverty, and stress as areas partially responsible for the disparate burden of adverse
pregnancy outcomes (APOs) such as preeclampsia among Black individuals. However, the
stark racial disparity for Black individuals remains, even after adjusting for such socioeconomic
and psychosocial factors. In order to narrow this disparity in preeclampsia, additional research
to fully understand the cause is crucial. While race is a social construct, the consequences of
this construct can have biological impact. Epigenomics represents a field where the impact of
environmental and behavioral factors on gene expression can be explored and nuanced
mechanisms of pathophysiology can be identified. The proposed analysis will allow us to
leverage existing resources to address a key evidence gap in the literature regarding the
epigenetic relationship between stress, race, and preeclampsia.
The Nulliparous Pregnancy Outcomes Study: Monitoring Mothers-To-Be (nuMoM2b) enrolled a
diverse cohort of 10,038 healthy nulliparous women at 8 US academic medical centers during
2010-2013, who were followed from early in conception through the delivery of their first child.
Extensive clinical phenotyping data exist for the pregnancy characteristics and pregnancy
outcomes of these study participants. The nuMoM2b Heart Health Study is comprised of 7,003
nuMoM2b participants who were recontacted at least once after their nuMoM2b birth, 4,508 of
whom returned for an in-person cardiovascular risk factor assessment 2-7 years later. A third
study wave of in-person visits will begin in early 2022. This cohort is thus uniquely positioned to
address questions about the role of stress in the pathophysiology of preeclampsia. With this
administrative supplement, we will capitalize on existing samples and data to (1) identify factors
that contribute to greater risk for development of preeclampsia in Black individuals compared to
White individuals, (2) produce a large methylation data set that will add another layer to existing
data (GWAS, proteomics), resulting in the largest multi-omics data set of pregnant individuals in
the U.S., that (3) can be leveraged for future longitudinal analyses that examine how stress,
self-identified race, other behavioral factors, and preeclampsia contribute to the emergence of
cardiovascular disease in years following pregnancy.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10418273
- **Project number:** 3U01HL145358-02S2
- **Recipient organization:** RESEARCH TRIANGLE INSTITUTE
- **Principal Investigator:** Philip Greenland
- **Activity code:** U01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $219,657
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2020-02-15 → 2027-01-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10418273

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10418273, Stress and Racial Disparities in Preeclampsia -  Clues from DNA Methylomic Profiling (3U01HL145358-02S2). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10418273. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*