O’Keeffe LM, Frysz M, Bell JA, et al. - Researchers examined if earlier puberty is more likely a result of adiposity gain in childhood than a cause of adiposity gain in adulthood via performing a prospective birth cohort study of 4,176 individuals born in 1991/1992 with 18,232 repeated estimates of fat mass from age 9 to 18 years. Repeated measures of height from 5 to 20 years were employed to determine puberty timing (age at peak height velocity, aPHV) and repeated measures of directly measured fat mass from age 9 to 18 years, from a contemporary UK birth cohort study, were used to model fat mass trajectories by chronological age and by time before and after puberty onset. Findings support correlation of prepubertal fat mass with earlier puberty timing but there appeared no correlation of puberty timing with post-pubertal fat mass change. Among females, earlier puberty timing is more frequently a result of adiposity gain in childhood than being a cause of adiposity gain in adulthood. In males, disparities in fat mass after puberty are driven partially by tracking of adiposity from early childhood as well as by higher gains in post-pubertal adiposity in males earlier to puberty. Overall findings support implementing interventions aimed at lowering levels of childhood adiposity as valuable to avert earlier puberty, adult adiposity and their adverse health outcomes in both females and males.