Postpartum Exercise Promotes Maternal-Infant Molecular Communication via Breast Milk Small Extracellular Vesicles

Early-life nutrition profoundly influences long-term metabolic health, and breast milk not only provides nutrients but also conveys maternal signals shaping infant metabolic development. While postpartum exercise by lactating women benefits maternal health, its impact on milk-borne signaling remains largely undefined. Small extracellular vesicles (sEVs) in breast milk are key mediators of maternal-infant communication because of their selectively packaged bioactive cargo and resistance to infant digestive enzymes and acids, enabling delivery of their cargo to peripheral tissues. Here, we show that a single session of moderate-intensity postpartum aerobic exercise robustly increases human breast milk sEV concentration, which persists for multiple post-exercise milk collections. Exercise enriches breast milk with sEVs containing regulatory metabolic cargo (proteins, miRNAs, and metabolites), which translates into enhanced mitochondrial capacity in neonatal-stage cells. These findings implicate sEVs as an exercise-responsive signaling compartment in breast milk capable of connecting postpartum maternal physical activity to beneficial infant metabolic programming.

Acute moderate-intensity exercise increases human breast milk sEV concentrationThe exercise-mediated sEV increase lasts for multiple subsequent milk expressionsExercise coordinates a multi-omic enrichment of sEVs in breast milkExercised breast milk sEVs enhance mitochondrial respiration in UC-MSCs.