Save the breast milk

I bet you don’t remember the first food you ever tasted – but it was probably breastmilk.

This sweet, ‘golden’ liquid is a veritable superfood, it contains all of the nutrients a growing infant needs, all in one complete package! And that’s no simple feat considering how rapid a physical development babies go through just in the span of a year.

Think about it. All that growing, all that moving, all that giggling, crying and endless learning about the world is all supported by breast milk. The true ‘One meal’ drink, despite what fitness marketing would tell you.

Bad news for babies

Unfortunately, this miracle substance that we’ve raised generations upon generations on, is now threatened. With the modern relentless march of progress, our environment has been irrevocably polluted, and thus, so have our bodies.

Contaminants of bygone decades linger in the soil, microbes, plants, livestock, and eventually find their way to us. Some of these compounds accumulate in fatty areas of the human body, such as the breast tissue, where it can contaminate the produced breast milk and possibly make its way to the newborn child through breastfeeding.

This is bad news for a number of reasons. Infants are, first of all, probably less able to fight the harmful effects of many contaminants and pollutants due to their still developing immune system. And second, harmful contaminants may be especially harmful in the early development stages of an infant, where they are very vulnerable.

This is very taboo

Luckily, most contaminants – some called persistent organic pollutants, POPs – are not harmful in small concentrations. But as they accumulate, they can interfere with the native hormonal system of the body.

Luckily, most contaminants are not harmful in small concentrations

The effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals like POPs are usually observed during puberty. Some experts believe that the heavily publicised sperm-count drop of males in their reproductive age could be a result of this pollution. But this is a very taboo and under-reported issue.

It is important to emphasize that health authorities around the world still believe the benefits of breastfeeding outweigh the risks. However, that does not mean a solution is not urgently needed. As most contaminants accumulated in breast tissue release during the very first breastfeeding event, it is crucial to secure the quality of these first ‘golden drops’.

Enter; MilkClear!

We may have the solution

We are Milkclear, the 2024 University of Copenhagen iGEM team – iGem, which is the biggest synthetic biology competition in the world.

We are determined to tackle the problem of breast milk pollution. And we have come up with an innovative solution with yeast that can be put in a gel and encapsulated in nipple covers, breast pumps or baby bottles.

This is how it works: As the yeast senses the contaminant, it lets out a light signal to show that the pollutant is present. This induces a detoxification system that works like a cupid’s arrow which is fired into the toxic compounds, making them suddenly love – i.e. connect to – water instead of fat. The contaminant will then let go of the tissue and pass through the infant’s system harmlessly via urination.

Infants and newborns are some of the most vulnerable members of our society; and they do not deserve to inherit the mistakes of older generations. It is vital to ensure that parents can trust their breast milk is safe, and that society takes accurate care to preserve the health of not just the environment, but of future generations.

If you want to know more about our project, please visit MilkClear’s website or Instagram.