Heliyon (Jan 2024)

Milk somatic cell DNA isolation and characterization of κ-casein gene in Halari donkey milk

  • Prashant Singh,
  • Anuradha Bhardwaj,
  • Varij Nayan,
  • Ram Avatar Legha,
  • Yash Pal,
  • Sonali Soni,
  • Shiv Kumar Giri,
  • T.K. Bhattacharya

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 2
p. e24991

Abstract

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Halari donkey breed is one of the indigenous breeds of India and its population is rapidly decreasing. The Jenny milk is more similar to human milk, exhibits a wide range of probiotic diversity and hypo-allergenicity, especially among infants suffering from cow and buffalo milk protein allergy. Some studies indicated low levels of κ-casein fraction of casein protein in donkey milk. The k-casein gene was not amplified from the DNA derived from the milk somatic cells of Halari donkeys. The Halari donkey milk has low somatic cells count. We report the first isolation of DNA from milk somatic cells of Halari donkeys with subsequent characterization of k-casein gene. Through our work, we showed that the milk somatic cells can be used as a non-invasive source for DNA isolation towards molecular studies. It also proved the presence of k-casein gene in Halari donkey milk by its amplification from isolated DNA.

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