Personalized human milk and nutrition for very low birth weight infants
Official title: Improving growth and neurodevelopment of very low birth weight infants through precision nutrition: The Optimizing Nutrition and Milk (Opti-NuM) Project.
Funded at Hospital for Sick Chldrn (Toronto) · NIH-11184357 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This project tailors human milk and nutrition for very low birth weight babies to help them grow better, support brain development, and lower serious complications like infections and gut disease.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Hospital for Sick Chldrn (Toronto) NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Toronto, Canada) |
| Project start | September 22, 2022 |
| Project end | August 31, 2026 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $477,421 |
| NIH project number | 5R01HD111018-04 |
| Project ID | NIH-11184357 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal candidates are newborns born very low birth weight (typically under 1500 grams) who are receiving care in participating neonatal intensive care units and whose families can provide milk and clinical samples.
✕Less likely to help
Full-term infants, children beyond the neonatal period, or infants not treated at participating centers (and adults) would not be eligible or likely to benefit directly.
What this research studies
If your baby was born very small, this project looks at the components of mother's milk and other nutrition options to customize feeding for each infant. Researchers will collect milk, blood, and stool samples and combine those data with parental health, infant genetics, and clinical status to guide individualized feeding plans. Babies enrolled at participating neonatal units will be followed for growth, neurodevelopment, and major illnesses to compare personalized feeding with current standard approaches. The team aims to identify which milk nutrients and bioactive factors matter most so feeding can be matched to each baby.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this could improve growth and brain development and reduce life-threatening complications in very low birth weight infants.
How similar studies have gone: Human milk is already known to reduce some preterm complications, but detailed precision-nutrition approaches based on milk composition and individual factors are newer with limited prior evidence.
Where this research is happening
-
Hospital for Sick Chldrn (Toronto)
Toronto, Canada Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: O'connor, Deborah — Hospital for Sick Chldrn (Toronto)
- Study coordinator: O'connor, Deborah
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.