[Immunological estimation of bovine casein in sheep cheese products (author's transl)]

Casein fraction of cow's milk and sheep's milk are very similar in their immunological behavior. Therefore, in the presence of sheep's milk, precipitation reaction with commercially obtained serum are not specific. Results from comparative immunoelectrophoresis according to Grabar and Williams also are equivocal, for heat and other denaturing factors caused shifts in the pattern of just the small group of differing elecrophoretic bonds present among many identical bonds. Qualitative identification of large amounts of cow's milk added to sheep's milk or of bovine casein to sheep cheese or similar products are possible in principle by two dimensional immunoelectrophoresis or so called crossed immunoelectrophoresis as described by Clarke and Freeman, but this estimation takes a lot of time and is not suitable for analysis of a series of samples. Sufficient sensitivity for certain and semiquantitative statements about the content of cows' milk casein in products from sheep's milk are obtained by the technique of radial double diffusion by Ouchterlony in Agarose gels only by the saturation of commercial anti-bovine-casein-serum by means of a suitable protein-standardized sheep's milk extract and its subsequent work-up and lyophilisation to yield a stable serum.