Protein plays a vital role in growth and development and is able to 'program' healthy growth by influencing gene methylation for positive long-term health outcomes. The understanding of these mechanisms is critical to support and improve the health of future generations in both the short and long term.The first part of this book reviews the role of hydrolyzed proteins in infant feeding and the evidence-based benefits of their use in non-breastfed infants at risk of allergy and in infants with functional gastrointestinal disorders. The second part focuses on human milk and its potential alternatives in the feeding of healthy term infants. The final section is dedicated to preterm infants, their nutrition needs, and physiological capacities to ingest adequate amounts of protein for appropriate growth and development. Presenting the latest scientific findings on protein in early nutrition, this publication provides essential reading for pediatricians and researchers alike.

Protein plays a vital role in growth and development and is able to 'program' healthy growth by influencing gene methylation for positive long-term health outcomes. The understanding of these mechanisms is critical to support and improve the health of future generations in both the short and long term.The first part of this book reviews the role of hydrolyzed proteins in infant feeding and the evidence-based benefits of their use in non-breastfed infants at risk of allergy and in infants with functional gastrointestinal disorders. The second part focuses on human milk and its potential alternatives in the feeding of healthy term infants. The final section is dedicated to preterm infants, their nutrition needs, and physiological capacities to ingest adequate amounts of protein for appropriate growth and development. Presenting the latest scientific findings on protein in early nutrition, this publication provides essential reading for pediatricians and researchers alike.

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Improved conditions of care for premature infants have led to markedly increased survival rates over the last few decades, particularly in very low and extremely low birth weight infants. Nutritional measures play a central role in the long-term outcome, health, and quality of life of these premature infants. In this updated and extended edition, leading experts from all over the world present the most recent evidence and critical analyses of nutrient requirements and the practice of nutritional care (with the focus on very low birth weight infants) to provide guidance for clinical application. The chapters of this publication show how growth and development can be nutritionally supported, which nutrients and non-nutrients can be supplied, and how nutritional care can get implemented. Approaches to nutritional care in various disease conditions are also addressed. The compilation of current information and recommendations should support the daily work of health care professionals such as neonatologists, paediatricians, other physicians involved in the care of preterm infants, nurses, nutritionists/dieticians, and others. The current book is also of interest for researchers who wish to keep up to date in this moving field.

Over the past several decades, advances in neonatal nutrition have focused on the provision of early parenteral nutrition and the development of formulas and supplements that most closely approximate maternal breast milk. The overall outcomes for infants, including premature infants, have greatly benefited from these advances, but there are still many nutritional unknowns that impact the lives of neonates. This is an exciting time in neonatal nutrition as the focus has shifted from survival and growth, which are still important goals, to effects of each micro/macronutrient on development, prevention of disease states such as ROP, the effects of neonatal nutrition on future health as an adult, and opportunities to improve long-term neurodevelopmental outcomes by optimal early nutrition. This issue focuses on aspects of enteral and parenteral nutrition that are at the forefront of neonatal care: assessing growth, parenteral nutrition components (including alternate lipid formulations), optimal storage and use of human milk (including donor milk), post-discharge nutrition, and the effects of various micro/macronutrients on long-term developmental outcomes. It is anticipated that the study and implementation of many of these novel concepts into the care of neonates, many of whom are severely premature, will be of value to practitioners, researchers, and, most of all, patients.

Infant formulas are unique because they are the only source of nutrition for many infants during the first 4 to 6 months of life. They are critical to infant health since they must safely support growth and development during a period when the consequences on inadequate nutrition are most severe. Existing guidelines and regulations for evaluating the safety of conventional food ingredients (e.g., vitamins and minerals) added to infant formulas have worked well in the past; however they are not sufficient to address the diversity of potential new ingredients proposed by manufacturers to develop formulas that mimic the perceived and potential benefits of human milk. This book, prepared at the request of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Health Canada, addresses the regulatory and research issues that are critical in assessing the safety of the addition of new ingredients to infants.

Other chapters focus on the nutritional importance of nonprotein nitrogen; the role of essential and nonessential amino acids in neonatal nutrition; the significance of nucleic acids, nucleotides, and related compounds in infants; and the role of tumor necrosis factor in protein metabolism.