The Milk Genome

The Milk Genome Project
Milk is the only bio-material that evolved for the purpose of nourishing growing mammals. Survival of mammalian offspring has exerted a strong selective pressure on the biochemical and genetic evolution of the lactation process, leading to the appearance of components that promote health, strength and ultimately survival. Scientific research can now mine this genetic legacy due to the recent arrival of a variety of mammalian genomes and the tools to understand them. The overall goal is to assemble the genetic instructions for the molecules in milk that arose through evolution, and to ultimately understand the basis for their production in milk and the nutritional advantage that they provide. The goal is broad and ambitious and clearly can be achieved neither in a single laboratory nor even a single institution—it is the logical goal of the world’s nutrition researchers. The Milk Genome Project was conceived to link the world’s scientific community around the goal of understanding the biological values of milk by housing the common set of information, orchestrating a common set of research tools. This International Consortium will guide and develop the set of software tools necessary to construct an internationally accessible Web environment. These tools will be used to poll various databases—including the human genome—to build data bases of genes discovered and sorted based on their selection as genes expressed during lactation in the mammary gland, and by so doing, obtain the subset of the human genome that is responsible for milk. The project will establish data base management tools that provide access to the milk genome data bases, annotates the data bases and coordinates ongoing research using the data bases all within its web site environment. The project will also create software protocols that will explore the structure and regulation of those genes that are induced by lactation within mammary epithelial cells. The annual meeting of The Milk Genome will assemble international experts in milk genomics and nutrition to set common priorities, share ongoing research and establish scientific consensus for the functions and validation of health benefits of the components of milk.