Q: Why do the blue eyes of babies often turn brown after a year or so?
A: Melanin is the pigment that makes body parts dark, said Burton Kushner, professor of ophthalmology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health. “Melanin makes freckles brown, hair brown and pigmented races brown, and it can make the iris brown as well. Melanin is not fully developed in newborn babies, so the iris is relatively devoid of whatever melanin pigment it will have, and that gives the eye its baby-blue eye color.”