During the past decades increasing epidemiological, clinical and basic science research, including both human and animal studies in vitro and in vivo, have been carried out to understand better the role of single parameters of parental health in the health of the offspring and through generations. Research has aimed to define the most vulnerable periods of development in early life and the possible pathways by which unfavorable milieu during fragile growth phases might affect health in adult life. There is a convincing amount of evidence that parental nutritional conditions and environmental stressors during gametogenesis and first days and weeks of embryo development can increase the risk of hypertension, obesity, type 2 diabetes, atopic conditions, some cancers, neurological impairment and mental health problems in adulthood [1–5]. Both human and animal studies have been carried out to show how future mothers’ diet, body composition, metabolism and stress before and during conception and early embryonic development determines the diseases in their children’s future life and how these effects might last over several generations [1, 2, 4–9].