Mothers milk is recommended for all newborn children. nonetheless, in some cases, breastfeeding is insufficient or unsuccessful or harmful for some medical reasons, or the mother decides not to bosom feed either at all or for a time. infant feeding formulas have been developed for these circumstances. immediate feeding formulas are widely used today to provide supplemental or sole source nutrition. recently, studies shown that breastfeeding may provide cognitive advantages. however, the connection between breast feeding and cognitive development is unclear. it was shown that lactoferrin (lf) might have a significant role as a contingent nutrient for the brain development and development of cognitive function in infants. thus, it was hypothesized that lf crosses the blood-brain barrier through a high affinity brain lactoferrin receptor (lrp) pathway. other studies suggested that lactoferrin might bind to a specific receptor on the brush border membrane, intelectin, to modulate autonomic nervous activity. lactoferrin is a glycoprotein with a molecular weight of about 80 kda, which binds to two iron atoms with high affinity. lf is found in mucosal secretions, including tears, saliva, vaginal fluid, semen, nasal and bronchial secretions, bile, gastrointestinal fluids, urine and most highly in milk and colostrum. this glycoprotein is one of the innate immune system components with broad range of antimicrobial activates comprising antiviral, antibacterial, antifungal and also anti-cancer and immunomodulatory actions. the objective of this study was to compare binding of different lf to brain lactoferrin receptors and intelectin by protein-ligand docking.

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