Fatty Acid Composition of Buffalo Colostrum from the Bulgarian Murrah Breed

Alexander Valchkov, Iliana Nacheva, Kamelia Loginovska, Veneta Tsvetkova

Abstract: An analysis of the fatty acid composition of buffalo colostrum from the Bulgarian Murrah breed was carried out and was compared to literature data with fatty acid profile of buffalo milks and colostrums of different ruminants. The extraction of milk fat was carried out by the Roese-Gottlieb method, and the methylation was performed with sodium methylate. The methyl esters of the fatty acids are analyzed using a gas chromatograph. The tested colostrum has a lower content of saturated fatty acids (58,71 g/100 g fat) and a higher content of monounsaturated fatty acids (38,64 g/100 g fat) than samples of buffalo milk and goat and sheep colostrums. The amount of polyunsaturated fatty acids is low – 3.52 g/100 g fat. A similar value was reported in samples of buffalo milk, while in goat colostrum was measured higher content. The analyzed buffalo colostrum is richer in conjugated fatty acids (CLA) (0.32 g/100 g fat) than goat colostrum, which shows that it has a higher biological and nutritional value in terms of CLA content. The buffalo colostrum has a high health potential because of the optimal values of the atherogenic index, the lipid preventative score and the ω-6/ω-3 ratio.

Keywords: atherogenic index; buffalo colostrums; fatty acids; lipid preventative score

Date published: 2019-06-26