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Cow Produces Low-Fat Milk

Scientists in New Zealand say they've discovered a cow that produces her own low-fat milk -- and found a way to replicate the mutation. There could be herds of low-fat cows in the future.

Biotechnology researchers are trying to breed a dairy herd of "low-fat cows" after finding udder-fresh low-fat milk from a single animal in 2001.

Back then scientists for a biotech firm called ViaLactica were researching variations in the milk produced by a New Zealand herd when they discovered "Marge," a cow with a natural mutation that reduced the fat in her milk to about 1 percent. Most cows produce milk with a fat level of 3.5%.

ViaLactica bought Marge for 300 New Zealand dollars ($218 US) and moved her to a research site.

Now the scientists are trying to refine Marge's genetic makeup in an experimental herd which they hope will produce industrial quantities of 0.1% low-fat millk. The milk will also have a high percentage of omega-3 fatty acids -- unsaturated fats, which the company claims can make butter that spreads easily at low temperatures, like margarine.

ViaLactica is one of the world's largest milk companies.

Marge's calves naturally produce low-fat milk, which shows the trait is dominant, says ViaLactica's chief scientist Russell Snell. His team hasn't isolated the exact chemical pathway responsible for the phenomenon, but the company does hope to have natural low-fat milk and spreadable butter on the market by 2011.

It could be a lucrative business because demand for less fat is on the rise. Low-fat milk is currently produced by separating fat from natural milk and turning it into butter and cream. But there's a limit to how much the industry can produce from surplus higher-fat milk, so this innovation could cut down on industry waste.

Until now it wasn't clear that a whole dairy herd could be engineered and bred with Marge's mutation. But now experts say the remaining problems are technical, not theoretical, so the breeding of a full-fledged low-fat herd is just a matter of time.

"Every now and then nature throws up these sorts of things, and it was simply a case of us being in the right place at the right time," Snell told the Associated Press.

msm/ap/spiegel