From the apparent distortion of the light stripes, the x, y, and z co-ordinates of individual points which track the light stripes are calculated by active triangulation. The aggregate of these points describes the three dimensional surface of the breast. Thus, the CBM system does not determine absolute breast volume, but rather measures a relative volume, that is, the volume of tissue enclosed within the black painted circle. It is assumed that when synthetic tissue is making and secreting milk, the volume of non-breast tissue remains the same. The CBM system has been designed to maximise accuracy and sensitivity for the measurement of changes in breast volume.
Popular theory suggests that milk synthesis is controlled through prolactin.
Thus, it was envisaged that the elevated prolactin levels would stimulate the synthesis of enough milk to replace the removed milk. We used the CBM system to measure the in vivo rate of milk synthesis and to investigate its relationship with prolactin. We measured the concentration of prolactin in the plasma before and 45 minutes after the commencement of breastfeeds over the first six months of lactation. Both the basal and the peak concentrations of prolactin in the plasma declined over this period. In contrast, neither 24 h milk production nor the average short-term rates of milk synthesis changed significantly over this period.