Animal Species Authentication in Dairy Products

Abstract

Milk is one of the most important nutritious foods, widely consumed worldwide, either in its natural form or via dairy products. Currently, several economic, health and ethical issues emphasize the need for a more frequent and rigorous quality control of dairy products and the importance of detecting adulterations in these products. For this reason, several conventional and advanced techniques have been proposed, aiming at detecting and quantifying eventual adulterations, preferentially in a rapid, cost-effective, easy to implement, sensitive and specific way. They have relied mostly on electrophoretic, chromatographic and immunoenzymatic techniques. More recently, mass spectrometry, spectroscopic methods (near infrared (NIR), mid infrared (MIR), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and front face fluorescence coupled to chemometrics), DNA analysis (real-time PCR, high-resolution melting analysis, next generation sequencing and droplet digital PCR) and biosensors have been advanced as innovative tools for dairy product authentication. Milk substitution from high-valued species with lower-cost bovine milk is one of the most frequent adulteration practices. Therefore, this review intends to describe the most relevant developments regarding the current and advanced analytical methodologies applied to species authentication of milk and dairy products.

Detection of Soybean-Derived Components in Dairy Products Using Proofreading Enzyme-Mediated Probe Cleavage Coupled with Ladder-Shape Melting Temperature Isothermal Amplification (Proofman–LMTIA)

“…Dairy products are one of the important sources of nutrition for the human body. However, fraud—driven by profits—often occurs, such as shoddy and adulterated dairy products with high value [ 4 , 5 , 6 ]. Therefore, the development of selective and sensitive detection techniques is a key challenge for the detection of authentic food, especially dairy products.…”

“…Driven by profits, fraud such as shoddy and adulterated dairy products with high value often occurs [ 4 , 5 , 6 ]. At present, the main adulterants in dairy products are nitrogen-containing compounds, vegetable proteins (such as soy protein) and animal proteins.…”

Application of nuclear magnetic resonance in food analysis

“…NMR is a powerful tool to detect the adulteration of dairy products (Mafra et al, 2022). Li et al used NMR to distinguish cow milk, goat milk and soy milk and to detect the addition of soy milk to the milk samples.…”

Spectroscopic techniques for authentication of animal origin foods

“…Moreover, with the advent of technology and increasing awareness among the consumer, ethical economic and health challenges, there arises an urgency for simple, stringent, precise, rapid, innovative, green and non- destructive quality control techniques for identifying the geographical origin, detection of adulterants and fraud in milk and milk products ( 156 ). Authentication of milk based commodities entails using analytical techniques to verify whether the products confirms to the specified labeling and complies with applicable laws and regulations ( 157 ).…”