Though milk glands are modified sweat glands, milk is not modified sweat.
This is one of those logical fallacies often perpetrated by the media.
Melanocytes (skin pigment cells) are derived from the neural crest, as are
brain cells and other neurons.  Does this give these two very distinct types
of cells similarities in their products or functions?  Of course not.  Milk
glands are much more complicated than sweat glands, they perform de novo (sp?)
synthesis of proteins, some fats, secrete immunoglobulins, allow lymphocytes
to pass into the milk, many more tasks than sweat glands.  Cells with the same
'roots' can grow up to be very different things.
Wish there was a requirement to study logic and epidemiology/research
interpretation before one could be a science reporter.
Catherine Watson Genna, IBCLC  NYC  [log in to unmask]