The Miracle of Producing Milk (2/3)

The Stages of Forming Pure Palatable Milk

Milk in cattle is synthesized through precise coordination between the digestive system, circulatory system and the reproductive system through the mammary glands in the udders and other organs, in exact calculated steps, for Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta’ala) assigned to every organ a function and specific duties to do so that we finally have pure milk palatable to those drinking it. The steps of synthesizing milk can be summed up as follows:

1. Digestion:

Digestion is of various types: mechanical digestion, chemical digestion and microbial digestion by means of the enzymes of the microbes in the rumen of the animal. The process of digestion starts in the mouth where the fodder is mechanically broken down into pieces and mixed with the saliva that contains the enzyme (amylase) that achieves the initial digestion that is followed by mechanical, microbial and chemical digestion in the compound stomach.[1]

Then the mass of food is returned to the mouth to be chewed once more and mixed with saliva in the process of rumination. It is then swallowed again and acted upon by the bacteria of the rumen where the carbohydrates[2] and proteins[3] are degraded. This is followed by the enzymatic digestion in the true stomach by means of such enzymes as the pepsin and rennin.

The processes of digestion lead to the change of the food into chyme. When the chyme moves into the small intestine it is exposed to the digestive enzymes[4] in the intestines, pancreas and the bile gland in the liver. Thus the nutrients are degraded from very complex particles into simple particles; starch and complex carbohydrates are converted into simple saccharides; lipids are converted into fatty acids; proteins into amino acids and peptides. As to vitamins, minerals and water, they need no digestion before being absorbed. The solid chyme, after being digested in the intestines, is converted into soft substance.[5]

2. The extraction from chyme:

The villi[6] in the small intestines absorb the degraded nutrients by various means. These nutrients then reach the capillaries that lie under the epithelial tissue and from there they enter the larger vessels and get involved in the blood circulation.

3. The extraction from blood:

Then blood carries these nutrients to the various parts of the body including the cells of udders where the components of milk are extracted from blood.

4. The synthesis of milk in the udder:

The udder is compared to an industrial compound. It is organized into lobes, with each lobe made up of many lobules. Each lobule contains 051-221 microscopic alveoli. Alveoli are sack-like structures where milk is synthesized and secreted. An alveolus is the discrete milk- producing unit consisting of a lumen for collecting milk lined by a single layer of epithelial cells.

Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta’ala) has made each cell in this industrial unit an integrated self-contained unit that changes the raw materials inside it that come from blood into a droplet of milk secreted into the lumen. These precursors leave the blood and enter the extra-cellular fluid between the capillaries and the epithelial cells. The precursors are then taken up from the extra-cellular fluid through the basolateral membrane of the epithelial cell. Once inside the cell the precursors enter the appropriate synthetic pathway. In addition, some preformed proteins, such as immunoglobulins, are transported intact through the cell. There are five routes by which milk precursors or components enter to produce milk in the alveolar lumen, including uptake of amino acids, uptake of sugars and salts, update of milk fat precursors, uptake of preformed proteins, immunoglobulins and the para cellular pathway.

(Continued)