Baboon Model for Infant Nutrition

Although there are only a limited number of nutritional studies performed with infant baboons, they are excellent models to investigate the influence of nutrition on early developmental processes that significantly impact human infants. By comparison with most mammalian species, newborn baboons are highly similar to human infants, although baboon infants are somewhat more developmentally mature at birth (indicated by teeth eruption and motor skills) by comparison with human babies. The infant baboon thrives on commercial human infant formulas and adapts readily to a peer social environment or can be raised in isolation by an animal handler.