Background: One important reproductive characteristic of Mammals is the production of milk to nurse the neonate. In order to better understand the evolution of milk we have investigated gene expression in milk cells from monotremes which are the most ancient representative of the mammalian lineage. Materials and Methods: Using a milk cell cDNA sequencing approach we characterise milk protein se...

Pigeon 'milk' and mammalian milk have functional similarities in terms of nutritional benefit and delivery of immunoglobulins to the young. Mammalian milk has been clearly shown to aid in the development of the immune system and microbiota of the young, but similar effects have not yet been attributed to pigeon 'milk'. Therefore, using a chicken model, we investigated the effect of pigeon 'milk...

In tsetse flies, nutrients for intrauterine larval development are synthesized by the modified accessory gland (milk gland) and provided in mother's milk during lactation. Interference with at least two milk proteins has been shown to extend larval development and reduce fecundity. The goal of this study was to perform a comprehensive characterization of tsetse milk proteins using lactation-spe...

Prolactin, glucocorticoids, and insulin are commonly used to induce milk protein synthesis in bovine mammary cell cultures. In addition, administration of GH increases milk yield in dairy cows, likely via the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway and IGF-I synthesis. As such, the hypothesis of this study was that mRNA abundance of hormone receptors, mammalian target of mTOR pathway-relat...

Through maternal effects, information about environmental conditions experienced in the maternal generation can be transmitted to subsequent generations. Although maternal effects have been described and quantified in many mammalian species, the underlying causal links are often under-studied. The close association between mother and neonate during the extended period of lactation in mammals pr...

Mammalian females pay high energetic costs for reproduction, the greatest of which is imposed by lactation. The synthesis of milk requires, in part, the mobilization of bodily reserves to nourish developing young. Numerous hypotheses have been advanced to predict how mothers will differentially invest in sons and daughters, however few studies have addressed sex-biased milk synthesis. Here we l...

Mammalian newborns exhibit avid responsiveness to odor compounds emanating from conspecific milk. Milk is however developmentally heterogeneous in composition as a function of both evolved constraints and offspring demand. The present study aimed to verify whether milk odor attractivity for neonates is equally distributed along lactation in Mus musculus (Balb-c strain). Therefore, we exposed pu...

A total of 32 lactating Holstein cows with mean body weight of 622 kg (s.e. = 24) were allotted, at week 25 of lactation, to eight groups of four cows blocked for similar days in milk. The objective of the experiment was to determine the effect of feeding four dietary concentrations (0, 50, 100 or 150 g/kg of dry matter) of whole flaxseed, which contains the plant lignan precursor secoisolarici...

It is the intention of this review to characterize milk's role as an epigenetic regulator in health and disease. Based on translational research, we identify milk as a major epigenetic modulator of gene expression of the milk recipient. Milk is presented as an epigenetic "doping system" of mammalian development. Milk exosome-derived micro-ribonucleic acids (miRNAs) that target DNA methyltransfe...

The advent of biotechnology has made data on undomesticated mammals relevant to dairy science. Such data indicate the potential of lactation for modification, reveal genetic material available for use through bioengineering, help distinguish adaptive features from historical artifacts, and clarify limits on lactational diversity that date from early evolution. Evolutionary analysis indicates th...