Chinese Scientists Make Cow Producing Human-Like Milk

hackingbear writes "Scientists from China Agricultural University have produced 17 healthy cloned cattle expressing recombinant human lysozyme using somatic cell nuclear transfer. Lysozyme, a bactericidal protein that protects human infants from microbial infections, is highly expressed in human milk but is found in only trace amounts in cow milk. The cloned cows produce milk with similar nutritional benefits as human milk, and the scientists hope their results will lead to new techniques that could be further refined for production of active human lysozyme on a large scale."

Comments

Yeah!

[MikeDirnt69]

Leave the breasts for the fathers!

human-like, not human

[spacefem]

This is all well and good, but it would take some seriously exhaustive studies to prove that this should be given to babies. Formula manufacturers have been trying to replicate human milk for YEARS without success. Milk is more than chemicals. It's hormones, it's enzymes, it changes based on what illnesses the mother is currently making antibodies for, it even changes from morning to night. I didn't think I'd ever become a breastfeeding militant, but it's happened... breastfeeding worked out so much better for my daughter & I than anyone ever lead me to believe, yet people still look for ways out of the "inconvenience" of, say, having to see women nurse in public (gasp!).

I love science, but if we're really smart we'd put less energy into trying to duplicate human milk, and look for more ways to support, assist, & enable nursing mothers.

Re:Breastfeed?

[Nidi62]

Or, you know, we could just breastfeed our kids.

Not every woman is able to breastfeed. Whether because they are taking medication for an illness, have had surgery or some medical condition that makes breastfeeding very unlikely if not downright impossible, or some other reason. These women are already being denied a major bonding experience between themselves and their baby(and this can be very traumatic for some women), why should their babies have to suffer by being given less healthy formula when it's possible for them to get something akin to human breast milk?