April 14, 2013

How much does a breast weigh?

Of course there is no one answer to this question as breast size obviously has a large effect on breast mass.
As a lead in to an article I plan on writing about breast velocity, acceleration and force at a run I thought I’d cover breast weight separately as to avoid information overload!
To keep things consistent I have selected a size 10 (32) band for each cup size below (as we know, cup volume changes with each different band size). These figures represent the weight of 1 breast, not both.
10A – .43kg
10B – .56kg
10C – .70kg
10D- .86kg
10E- 1.1kg
10F – 1.3kg
10G – 1.5kg
10H – 1.8kg
Naturally the above is just a guide, breast mass can differ from person to person depending on the ratio of dense breast tissue to fatty tissue in the breast. The average density of breast tissue is considered to be 0.9kg/L.
For product developers and breast biomechanists breast mass is regarded often as it is well documented that breast mass is correlated with vertical breast displacement. This means that bras designed for those with a larger breast mass will need to be engineered to control more motion.
And… breast mass also plays an important role in determining the force of the breast during different gait patterns/speeds and support conditions.
If you’re interested in calculating the exact weight of each of your breasts there is simple way to do this at home, it is a test based on some basic physics principles. This could be a helpful way to determine a size discrepancy, which may also assist in figuring out how much padding you should use to even out your size difference.
HOW TO MEASURE BREAST MASS
1. Fill (to the brim) a bowl with warm water. Make sure the bowl is considerably bigger than your breast.
2. Weigh an oven / roasting tin.
3. Place your bowl of water on top of the oven / roasting tin.
4. Submerge your total mass of breast tissue in to the bowl of water. The water that spills out of your bowl and in to the oven tin should represent your breast volume.
5. Weigh the oven tin with the water. Subtract the original weight of the tin.
6. As breast tissue weighs approx. 0.9kg/L in order to convert this to the weight of breast tissue multiple the water weight by 0.9.