Women who eat root vegetables and potatoes during pregnancy may expose their children to a greater risk of type one diabetes, an Australian study has found.

Scientists at Melbourne's Monash University say a common toxin which causes potato scab in root vegetables may affect the development of the foetus' pancreas in pregnant women, and act as a trigger for type one diabetes in genetically pre-disposed children.

Researchers carried out tests on a group of mice susceptible to diabetes and found that those whose mothers were fed Bafilomycin, a toxin which commonly occurs in root vegetables, were more likely to have a damaged pancreas and develop diabetes.

University professor of biochemistry Paul Zimmet said 70% of the susceptible mice normally developed diabetes over 30 weeks.

However he said, of the mice whose mothers were fed Bafilomycin, all developed diabetes much more quickly.

"The ones that we fed Bafilomycin 100% had diabetes by 20 weeks," he said

Zimmet, who is also the director of the Melbourne-based International Diabetes Institute, said linking the disease to the human diet would change thinking about the cause of type one diabetes, also known as insulin dependent diabetes.

"We think people have been looking in the wrong place," Prof Zimmet said.

"(They've been) looking at the events during childhood rather than what happened to the mother during pregnancy."

Zimmet said the Bafilomycin toxin was common in root vegetables and could not be destroyed through cooking.

He advised pregnant women with a history of type one diabetes in their family to carefully peel vegetables and remove "scabs".

© AAP