Biology Class XII

Investigatory Project

Fahad Meeran S
Class XII-A2
 Certificate

This is to certify that this is a bonafide record of biology

project work done by Master.Fahad Meeran .S of class XII
and section A2 during the year 2022-2023 in Velammal
Bodhi Campus, Anuppanadi, Madurai

Teacher Incharge Principal

Date:

Internal Examiner External Examiner

 Acknowledgement

I would like to express my special thanks of gratitude to my Botany

teacher MR. RAJASEKARAN and Zoology teacher MRS.SUJATHA.T.R
for their able guidance and support in completing my project

I would like to extend my gratitude to the principal sir

MR.BALAMURUGAN and Vice Principal mam MRS.ANITHA
ARAVINDH for providing with all the facilities that was required and
timely support

I thank our Chairman and Vice Chairman of Velammal Bodhi

Campus ,Anuppanadi, Madurai for providing usample facilities to
learn many things while doing this investigatory project and to
complete it on time.

Finally, I would like to thank my parents who helped me a lot in

finalizing this project within the limited time frame
INDEX
1. Introduction
2. Causes
 Alcohol Abuse

 Use of Illegal and Illicit Drugs

 Ciggarate smoking

 Stress

 Effect of foetal injury

 Human Reproductive Anatomy and Physiology-

Contraceptives

3. Conclusion
4. Bibliography

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Introduction
When you write about Ashttavakra, the person who comes to your thought is
Abhimanyu. After all, was a boy who learnt things while in his mother's
womb. Abhimanyu was the son of Arjuna, the third Pandava and Subhadra,
Krishna's sister. According to mythology, he was the reincarnation of Varchas,
the son of Chandra, the moon God.

GARBHSANSKAR essentially means educating the mind of the fetus. This is

derived from Sanskrit words Garbh [fetus in the womb] and Sanskar
[educating the mind]. It is traditionally believed that a child’s mental and
behavioral development starts as soon as he is conceived. His personality
begins to take shape in the womb, and this can be influenced by the mother’s
state of mind during pregnancy. This knowledge can be traced back to ancient
scriptures and is included in the Ayurveda.

Although it may sound strange and weird, your bond with your child starts
right from the time you conceive. It is not that when the child is born you
know him. The baby listens to you and feels your feelings even when it is
developing in your womb.

You can shape up your baby’s first impressions by listening to good music,
visualizing, massaging gently meditating and of course, with the help of
positive thinking.
Maternal nutrition and behavior plays a critical role in fetal growth and
development. Although considerable effort has been directed towards defining
nutrient requirements of animals over the past 30 years, suboptimal nutrition
during gestation remains a significant problem for many animal species.

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Maternal under nutrition during gestation reduces placental and fetal growth
of both domestic animals and humans. Available evidence suggests that fetal
growth is most vulnerable to maternal dietary deficiencies of nutrients during
the peri-implantation period and the period of rapid placental development.

Under nutrition in pregnant women may result from low intake of dietary
nutrients owing to either a limited supply of food or severe nausea and
vomiting known as hyperemesis gravidarum in first trimester of pregnancy.
Growth retardation of fetus due to hypertension, oligohydramnios, anemia of
mother during pregnancy.

Pregnant women may also be at increased risk of under nutrition because of

early or closely-spaced pregnancies. Since pregnant teenage mothers are
themselves growing, they compete with their own fetuses for nutrients,
whereas short interpregnancy intervals result in maternal nutritional depletion
at the outset of pregnancy. Low birth weights and preterm deliveries in
adolescent pregnancies are more than twice as common as in adult
pregnancies, and neonatal mortality in adolescent pregnancies is almost three
times higher than for adult pregnancies.

Further, placental insufficiency results in reduced transfer of nutrients from

mother to fetus, thereby leading to fetal under nutrition and IUGR. Finally,
due to competition for nutrients, multiple fetuses resulting from assisted
reproductive technologies are often at risk of under nutrition and therefore
fetal growth restriction. Thus, various nutritional and pathological conditions
can result in IUGR.

Pregnant women are usually recommended to avoid soft cheeses, smoked fish,
precooked meats and foods made with unpasteurized milk. These foods may
contain a bacterium called Listeria. This bacterium does not usually cause
people much harm, but even a mild infection in a pregnant woman may cause
miscarriage.

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 CHANGES DURING PREGNANCY

EFFECTS OF MATERNAL BEHAVIOUR ON FETAL DEVELOPMENT

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Causes
1. Alcohol Abuse
Drinking alcohol when you're pregnant can be very harmful to your baby. It can cause
your baby to have a range of lifelong health conditions. Drinking alcohol during
pregnancy can cause miscarriage, preterm birth and stillbirth.
When you drink alcohol during pregnancy, so does your baby. The same amount of
alcohol that is in your blood is also in your baby's blood. The alcohol in your blood
quickly passes through the placenta and to your baby through the umbilical cord.
Although your body is able to manage alcohol in your blood, your baby's little body
isn't. Your liver works hard to break down the alcohol in your blood. But your baby's
liver is too small to do the same and alcohol can hurt your baby's development. That's
why alcohol is much more harmful to your baby than to you during pregnancy.
Alcohol can lead your baby to have serious health conditions, called fetal alcohol
spectrum disorders (FASD). The most serious of these is fetal alcohol syndrome
(FAS). Fetal alcohol syndrome can seriously harm your baby's development, both
mentally and physically.

Alcohol can also cause your baby to:

• Have birth defects (heart, brain and other organs)
• Vision or hearing problems
• Be born too soon (preterm)
• Be born at low birth weight
• Have intellectual disabilities
• Have learning and behavior problems
• Have sleeping and sucking problems
• Have speech and language delays
• Have behavioral problems

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Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD)
Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders are a group of conditions that can occur in a person
whose mother drank alcohol during pregnancy. Symptoms can include an abnormal
appearance, short height, low body weight, small head size, poor coordination, behavior
problems, learning difficulties and problems with hearing or sight.

A baby suffering with FASD

2. Use of Illegal and Illicit Drugs

It's possible that you may not have a serious or long-lasting problem after using drugs.
But the same is not always true for a fetus. Drug-using mothers often give birth to
"drug babies." These children have a host of developmental problems.

Studies show that using drugs -- legal or illegal -- during pregnancy has a direct
impact on the fetus. If you smoke, drink alcohol, or ingest caffeine, so does the fetus.
If you use marijuana or crystal meth, your fetus also feels the impact of these
dangerous drugs. And if you are addicted to cocaine -- also called coke, snow, or blow

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-- you're not only putting your own life on the line, but you are risking the health of
your unborn baby.

The consequences of using cocaine include heart attacks, respiratory failure, strokes,
and seizures. And these life-threatening health problems can also be passed to an
unborn baby. Taking drugs during pregnancy also increases the chance of birth defects,
premature babies, underweight babies, and stillborn births. Exposure to drugs such as
marijuana -- also called weed, ganja, dope, or pot -- and alcohol before birth has been
proven to cause behavior problems in early childhood. These drugs can also affect the
child's memory and attentiveness. In addition, some findings show that babies born to
women who use cocaine, alcohol, or tobacco when they are pregnant may have brain
structure changes that persist into early adolescence.

While cocaine's effects are usually immediate, the effect it can have on a fetus may
last a lifetime. Babies born to mothers who smoke crack cocaine during pregnancy --
so-called ''crack babies'' -- usually have their own set of physical and mental problems.
According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, exposure to cocaine in the womb
can lead to subtle, yet significant, deficits later in children

Effects of various drugs on fetus during pregnancy

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 3. Cigarette Smoking
Smoking during pregnancy affects you and your baby’s before, during, and after your
baby is born. The nicotine (the addictive substance in cigarettes), carbon monoxide, and
numerous other poisons you inhale from a cigarette are carried through your bloodstream
and go directly to your baby. Smoking while pregnant will:
• Increase your baby's heart rate.
• Increase the chances of miscarriage and stillbirth.
• Increase the risk that your baby is born prematurely and/or born with low birth weight.
• Increase your baby's risk of developing respiratory (lung) problems.
• Increases risks of birth defects.
• Increases risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.
• Lower the amount of oxygen available to you and your growing baby
The more cigarettes you smoke per day, the greater your baby's chances of developing
these and other health problems. There is no "safe" level of smoking while pregnant.
Carbon monoxide combines with haemoglobin (Hb) in the fetus red blood cells. If the Hb
is combined with carbon monoxide then it cannot combine with oxygen. So when a
mother smokes, she reduces the amount of oxygen being carried in her own bloods and
also the baby’s blood.
Nicotine reduces the diameter of the fetus’ blood vessels. This reduces the volume of
blood that can flow through them. This, too, reduces the amount of oxygen reaching the
fetus.

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4. Stress
Effect of maternal stress associated with poor birth outcomes including preterm birth,
infant mortality and low birthweight. Stress results in increases in cortisol,
norepinephrine and inflammation which affect the fetal environment and have
implications for maternal and infant health.

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EFFECTS OF STRESS ON HYPOTHALAMUS PITUITARY AXIS DURING
PREGNANCY

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Stress and Long-term Health and
Developmental Outcomes
Maternal stress can also negatively impact the health and development of infants and
children:

• Stress may increase the risk for developmental delay among low birthweight
babies even if they did not experience initial neonatal complications.

• Several studies show an association between maternal stress in pregnancy and

congenital heart defects.

• Maternal bereavement during the prenatal period and 6 months’ preconception was
associated with increased risk of overweight or obesity in their children which may
be due to severe stress exposure early in life.

• Women with high levels of stress in pregnancy had an increased likelihood of

having children with autism-like characteristics; this association was most
pronounced in children of women with high stress levels during the first
• trimester.

• One study found that increased fetal cortisol levels may affect the function of a
certain part of the brain, which leads to impaired cognitive reaction time in
adolescence

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5. Effect of Fetal Injury
Placental abruption is the most common cause of fetal death from trauma in pregnancy.
Force from trauma can steer the placenta from the uterine wall and lead to fetal
demise. Uterine rupture, though rare, usually occurs in the third trimester and is
associated with high risk of fetal and maternal mortality.

Direct fetal injury is very rare in blunt trauma complicating less than 1% of all
significant maternal trauma.

The maternal soft tissue, uterus, and amniotic fluid all provide a significant degree of
protection to the fetus.

Those cases of direct fetal injury that do occur are usually late in the gestational
period.
The most commonly reported direct fetal injury is head injury.

For example: In the film “Koi mil Gaya” directed by Rakesh Roshan. The actor
Hritik Roshan played the role of an abnormal boy Rohit Mehra. His mother had
occurred a foetal injury during car accident. This accident brought the abnormal
characteristics to Rohit.
(A case of trauma during pregnancy)

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6. Human Reproductive Anatomy and
Physiology- Contraceptives
Effective public health programs, research, and policy relating to human sexuality,
pregnancy, contraception, and the transmission of sexually transmitted infections
(including HIV) depends upon knowledge of the structure(anatomy) and function
(physiology) of the male and female reproductive systems. Human beings are sexual
throughout life. Sexuality encompasses more than sexual behavior - it is not only the
physical, but the mental and spiritual as well. Sexuality is a core component of
personality and a fundamental part of human life. While the problems usually
associated with sexual behavior are real and need to be addressed, human sexuality
also has significant meaning and value in each individual's life.
Sixty-one percent of all women worldwide who are within the reproductive age (15-44
years old), are using methods of contraception (methods used to deliberately prevent
pregnancy). No method of contraception is 100% effective other than complete
abstinence from sexual intercourse. However, many methods exist that are close to
100% effective if used consistently and correctly. People frequently fail to use their
method every time or to use it perfectly.

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CONCLUSION
In short, women should be very careful during pregnancy. Findings from the current
study indicate that excessive GWG and mothers’ eating behaviors during pregnancy,
especially intake of sweets in overweight/obese mothers, may influence offspring weight
status early in infancy. More research with larger sample sizes and frequent assessments
of diet is needed to inform the impact of timing of nutrient exposures on offspring weight
status. Also, future adequately powered randomized clinical trials are needed to
determine whether modifying maternal prenatal behaviors and GWG can prevent
offspring obesity. Identifying modifiable, prenatal causes of childhood obesity will
inform future interventions targeting pregnancy as a “teachable moment” for primary and
secondary obesity prevention.
The popularity of GarbhSanskar is also because researchers have proved its relevance and
importance in the development of the child. There are scientific evidences that prove that
a baby inside the mother’s womb responds to the outside stimulus and has the ability to
listen. Doctors and experts also believe that there is a significant effect of the hormonal
secretions that are activated by the thoughts of a mother on the unborn baby.

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Bibliography
1. Biological Science: Third Edition by, N. P. O. Green (Author), G. W.
Stout (Author), D. J. Taylor (Author), R. Soper (Editor)

2. NCERT Text Book class XII biology Chapter 4; pg. :58. Reproductive
Health

3. Wadhwa PD, et al., 2011. The contribution of maternal stress to preterm

birth: issues and considerations. Clin Perinatol. 2011;38(3):351-84.

4. Walder DJ et al. Prenatal maternal stress predicts autism traits in 61/2

year-old children: Project ice storm. Psychiatry Research. 2014 (in press).

5. Cardwell MS. Stress: Pregnancy considerations. Obstetric Gynecology

Survey. 2013;68(2):119-29

6. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maternal_effect

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