Growth and metabolic biomarkers of healthy term infants fed formulas with staged protein concentrations over the first year of life

The overall objective of this study is to assess growth and biomarkers of energy and protein metabolism in healthy term infants fed with two different study formula regimens from birth to 12 months of age and to follow up the infants to 4 years of age.

Inclusion Criteria:

Healthy infants will be enrolled in the study provided they meet the following inclusion criteria:

1. Having obtained his/her parents' (or his/her legally accepted representative's [LAR's]) written informed consent and having evidence of personally signed and dated informed consent document indicating that the infant's parents/LAR have been informed of all pertinent aspects of the study.
2. Age ≤ 7 days after birth (date of birth = Day 0)
3. Full-term gestational birth (≥ 37 and ≤ 42 weeks)
4. Born to mothers with pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI) ≥ 18.5 and < 26 kg/m2
5. Born to mothers who independently elected, before study enrollment, not to breastfeed (not applicable for infants in the HM-fed comparator group)
6. Weight ≥ 2'500 g and ≤ 4'200 g
7. Infant's parent(s)/LAR is of legal age of consent, has sufficient command of French language to complete the informed consent and other study documents, and is willing and able to fulfill the requirements of the study protocol
8. Infant's parent(s)/LAR is able to be contacted directly by telephone throughout the study

Exclusion Criteria:

Infants who exhibit one or more of the following criteria are excluded from enrollment in the study:

1. Born to mothers with hormonal or metabolic disease (e.g. Type-1, Type-2, or gestational diabetes diagnosed according to standardized criteria)
2. Born to mothers who smoked > 10 cigarettes per day during pregnancy
3. Born to mothers who used illicit drugs (e.g. marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, or heroin) or alcohol (> 3 alcoholic beverages per week) during pregnancy
4. Cognitive or physical developmental disorders (e.g. malabsorptive disorders such as short bowel syndrome; neurological and congenital disorders that may delay growth such as cerebral palsy, agenesis of the corpus callosum, spina bifida, Down Syndrome, Cri Du Chat; disorders that may lead to obesity such as Prader willi syndrome, Angelman syndrome; other renal, hepatic, pancreatic, or cardiovascular disorders)
5. Received radiation therapy (eg. scannography or interventional radiology)
6. Participation in any other clinical trial prior to enrollment
7. Infants or infant's family who in the Investigator's judgment cannot be expected to comply with the protocol or study procedures