Expert's opinion

Objectives: Infant formulas provide more protein than breast milk. High protein intakes, as well as maternal obesity, are risk factors for later obesity. The present study tested whether a formula with lower protein content slows weight gain of infants of overweight mothers (body mass index [BMI]>25 kg/m2).

Preterm deaths are responsible for the highest number of neonatal mortality in Nigeria. Preterm nutrition contributes significantly to overall outcome particularly as it relates to neurodevelopment. Recently, new guidelines for enteral feedings in premature infants were issued by the American Academy of Paediatrics and European Society of Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition Committee on Nutrition.

Colic can be a nightmare for parents of young babies. The spontaneous episodes of fussing and crying that come with colic can lead to weeks, or even months, of difficult days and sleepless nights.

I first came into contact with HMOs in 1984 when researching alongside my supervisor who was very interested in glycoproteins, carotenoids and oligosaccharides. He had studied for his PhD under Richard Kuhn, the Austrian-German biochemical pioneer who classified HMOs via clinical trials for the first time in the 1950s.

Antibiotics are designed to kill the bacteria that make us sick. We are increasingly aware that they also killing the bacteria that makes us healthy – the “good bacteria”. There are many consequences of this: our gut microbiota help us extract energy from food, and they regulate how much weight a baby gains.

We wanted to look at the possibility of reducing allergies in infants, via the mother. We gave nutritional counselling to the mothers in the study from the first trimester of pregnancy alongside a probiotic combination. The study continued from this point, through the entire pregnancy, birth and until the mother stopped breastfeeding. We were interested in the outcomes for the child.

Human milk oligosaccharides (HMO) are complex sugars that mothers produce in very large quantities in their breast milk. We can think of them as fibres, and the baby cannot consume them. One of goals of the oligosaccharides is to alter the gut bacteria of the infant.

We have been studying human milk for many decades, and recently discovered that it contains indigestible material, which was very interesting. Mothers appear to be synthesizing molecules that go right through the baby. We decided to investigate this in detail.