According to a new research, children who are born to mothers who are involved in certain occupations could be at a high risk of birth defects including gastrointestinal, spinal and heart malformations.

The study, led by Dr. Michele Herdt-Losavio, has asserted that the depending upon the vocation of the pregnant mother, a fetus can develop one of the 45 physical defects that have been put forward by the research team, which are totally unrelated to the DNA.

It has been revealed that female janitors are at the highest risk of delivering children with physical birth defects, while teachers are at the lowest risk. Also, scientists' children are more exposed to the risk of contracting from 5 of the listed defects.

"Given those job titles, one would expect those women to work with different chemicals or something that could possibly be an exposure", the researchers noted.

For the sake of study, data collected for more than 9,000 mothers across US was studied, and each of these women had given birth to babies with 1 or more of the defects. Analysis of the data collected against their occupations led researchers to their conclusions.

Findings of the study, which is now being viewed as a cue to research the issue further, have been detailed in the journal Occupational and Environmental Medicine.