Day 2 - March 11

HMI'26 Program Day 2 - Main Symposium

Wednesday, March 11, 2026

8:00 AM

Check-in opens
Light breakfast will be served
Poster mounting in breakout rooms

9:00 AM

Welcome Remarks

Mitra Hooshmand, PhD
Executive Director, Human Milk Institute
UC San Diego

Lars Bode, PhD
Founding Director, Human Milk Institute
UC San Diego

9:30 AM

First morning sessions begins

Opening Session: Immunology of Human Milk

Location:

Samuel H. Scripps Auditorium

Moderator:

Lars Bode, PhD
Director, Human Milk Institute
UC San Diego

9:30 AM

Immune control of maternal physiology

Yasmine Belkaid, PhD
President, Institut Pasteur
France

10:00 AM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
Mousing around: Utilizing mouse models to dissect how milk antibodies calibrate early life intestinal homeostasis

Meera Shenoy, PhD
Principal Scientist
A*STAR Singapore Immunology Network

10:15 AM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
to be selected

this could be YOU...
submit an abstract!

10:30 AM

Coffee Break

11:00 AM

Second morning session begins

Focus Session: Clinical Implications of Human Milk Research

Location:

Samuel H. Scripps Auditorium

Moderator:

Jae Kim, MD, PhD
Professor of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine
Director, Perinatal Institute – Division of Neonatology
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center

11:00 AM

Maternal milk for an overlooked population: moderate and late preterm infants

Aloka L. Patel, MD
Glore Family Professor of Neonatology
Division Head of Neonatology
Research Director for Neonatology
Rush University Children’s Hospital, Chicago

11:30 AM

Non-nutritional uses of human milk: Milk as therapy

Rebecca Hoban, MD, MPH
Associate Professor of Pediatrics, University of Washington
Director of Breastfeeding Medicine
Director of Clinical Guideline Development
Division of Neonatology, Seattle Children’s Hospital

12:00 PM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
Metabolic Hormone Content Differs Between Pasteurized Donor Breast Milk and Preterm Maternal Breast Milk

Ting Ting Fu, MD
Neonatologist, Associate Professor of Pediatrics
Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center

12:15 PM

Patient Family Perspective
From Preemie to Parent: A breastmilk story across time

Sunita Sridhar, MD
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics
University of California San Diego / Rady Children’s Hospital

12:30 PM

Group Photo, Lunch, and Meet-Up Hub

2:00 PM

Afternoon sessions begin

Focus Session: The Future of Donor Human Milk

Location:

Samuel H. Scripps Auditorium

Moderator:

Alison Wolf, CPNP-PC, IBCLC
UC Health Milk Bank
Human Milk Institute
UC San Diego

2:00 PM

Winds of Change for European Milk Banks: European Regulation on SoHO and Beyond

Sertac Arslanoglu, MD
President, European Milk Bank Association (EMBA)
Administrative Director of the Division of Neonatology & Department of Pediatrics İstanbul Medeniyet University, School of Medicine, İstanbul, Turkey
Scientific Coordinator and Member of the Board of Directors, Italian Association of Human Milk Banks (AIBLUD), Milan, Italy

2:30 PM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
Development of the Polish Human Milk Bank Network MILKNET: From a Community Initiative to EU SoHO Regulation

Aleksandra Wesolowska, MD
Head of Human Milk and Lactation Reserch
Medical University of Warsaw, Poland

2:45 PM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
to be selected

this could be YOU...
submit an abstract!

Focus Session: Breastfeeding Interventions - From Academia to the "Real World"

Location:

Samuel H. Scripps Auditorium

Moderator:

tbn

3:00 PM

Learnings from building a breastfeeding intervention database – new ways to bridge the gap from academic research to operating at scale in the real world

Katharina Lichtner, PhD
Managing Director
Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation
Switzerland

3:30 PM

Short talk selected from submitted abstracts
From Culture to Science to Community: Translating the Global Practice of Infant Carrying into Real-World Breastfeeding Interventions

Emily Little, PhD
Founder
Nurturely

3:45 PM

tbd

Shana Wright, MPH, CLEC
Director of Community Outreach & Engagement
Human Milk Institute
UC San Diego

4:00 PM

Poster Session I
Sunset Cocktail Reception

5:30 PM

End of Day 2