It has long been conventional wisdom that women must not put on too much weight in pregnancy. Today, however, undernutrition and underweight during pregnancy in particular are posing a problem, because nutritional status in the womb could potentially have a major impact on the child’s future risk of developing lifestyle diseases. There are even reports that lack of protein at the fetal stage could place the child at risk of impaired blood pressure regulation later in life. Scientists believe that this is because the mother’s diet during pregnancy affects epigenetics, which controls gene function. It has also become apparent that the mother’s nutritional status can even affect her grandchildren.