Daniele,

My answer is not research based, except for the reading I have done on
embryology research. During embryological and fetal growth, the primary bud
"sprouts" off secondary buds that canalize sometime near 20 weeks of
pregnancy. These are the basic rudiments for future breast lobes. Some have
15-20 secondary buds, and all canalize, and through adolescence and
pregnancy develop into complete lobes, and can therefore have many more
alveoli than mothers who have fewer secondary buds, some of which may not
canalize, and therefore end up with fewer lobes, fewer alveoli, etc.

Mothers with fewer lobes, alveoli, etc. must remove milk oftener to
stimulate the same (or close to the same) amount of milk that mothers with
more lobes (and more ducts, and therefore more storage capacity) do.

In my experience, overactive MER is closely associated with relative
oversupply and therefore volume-related. MER in veterinary medicine can be
stimulated by pressure, presumably without oxytocin involved. This is called
the "tap reflex". (calves butting their mothers' udders).  I have found
veterinary references a fertile place to find information on milk ejection
reflex, as the dairy industry was the first to study the phenomenon, for the
sake of profit. Of course, herdsmenew experientially about the "draught"
reflex for eons.

Jean
*******
K. Jean Cotterman RNC, IBCLC
Dayton, Ohio USA

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