Belarusian human lactoferrin suggested for dietary supplements

Scientists suggest using human lactoferrin extracted from goat milk for making dietary supplements, BelTA learned from Alexander Budevich, head of the lab for the reproduction and genetic engineering of farm livestock of the Animal Husbandry Research Center of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, on 19 November.

Alexander Budevich remarked that scientists from the Physiology Institute of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, the Genetics and Cytology Institute of the Academy, medical institutions are now involved in the research into the qualities of human lactoferrin extracted from goat milk. Many useful qualities of lactoferrin have been found. “It is necessary to determine the list of products, which can be manufactured using lactoferrin extracted from goat milk. It is a new organic substance, not a product of biochemical industry,” he stressed.

Nikolai Popkov, Director General of the Animal Husbandry Research Center of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, said that new equipment had been bought to process goat milk. The equipment will be installed by 2015. “We have already raised transgenic animals. Now we face a task as difficult. We have to make end products that could be used for medical and food purposes. We are working on it,” noted Nikolai Popkov.

Nikolai Popkov stressed that a pilot production lab to make medications had been created in the Belarusian State University. It is too early to consider industrial processing for now. “We need to polish the technology first. We plan to build a large industrial enterprise but it will need time. I cannot say yet when it will happen,” he added.

One liter of goat milk contains about 6g of human lactoferrin (10g in some cases). The lactoferrin extracted from transgenic goat milk is a unique product developed by Belarusian and Russian scientists. The physical and chemical qualities of transgenic goat milk lactoferrin are identical to those of human breast milk. This protein increases the resistance of human bodies to diseases. Apart from bactericidal qualities lactoferrin demonstrates anti-inflammatory, detoxing, antioxidative and antitumoral qualities.