Protein Profile Characterization of Donkey Milk

Milk is a biological fluid designed to contain all nutritional requirements of a specific mammalian newborn; therefore, the composition of milk differs by the needs of the neonate of different species. Although much research has been devoted to milk composition in the domestic horse, donkey’s milk has recently aroused scientific interest, above all among paediatric allergologists and nutritionists. Clinical studies have demonstrated that donkey milk may be considered a good replacer for dairy cow’s milk in feeding children with severe Ig-E mediated cow’s milk protein allergy, when human milk can not be given 1. For these patients, donkey milk is not only useful 2, but also safer compared with milk obtained by other mammalian species 3, due to the high similarity with human milk, especially considering protein fractions content 4, 5.