In our study, obese dams had a decreased relative abundance of a number of bacterial genera belonging to the butyrate-producing families, and with this we observed a significant reduction in maternal caecal butyrate levels and decreased transcripts of SCFA receptors Ffar3, Ffar2 and Hcar2 and the mucosal protein Muc2. The extent to which these changes result in changes in maternal intestinal epithelial function is still unknown, although in other work we have observed an obesity-induced loss of maternal barrier integrity at E18.520. The gene discussed is HCAR2; the disease is obesity due to melanocortin 4 receptor deficiency.