by Amanda Smith, Associate Editor
"What's fascinating is that milk has become fashionable again. Nutritionally, we're just beginning to understand what milk can do," noted Food For Health Ireland CEO Jens Bleiel. In terms of the science surrounding them, milk and dairy have undergone a revival.
To advance dairy's health-focused message, partnerships are essential. Instead of encouraging competition, Food for Health Ireland (FHI) fosters an open innovation model between research universities.
"We cannot do research in an ivory tower. Science has to have real-life applications. When it comes to dairy, we need to see what the market needs and create a solution to deliver on it," added Bleiel.
One of the six research branches FHI tackles is healthy cheese. "Scientists made a mistake 20 years ago when evaluating cheese consumption and human health. They looked at isolated ingredients, such as salt and fatty acids, when they really need to look at the whole matrix," said Bleiel.
Yet, cheese may offer more health benefits than we're aware of. Recent data from FHI has shown that cheese consumption actually improves many biomarkers it was once believed to worsen.
Infant nutrition is also an FHI research arm. "Approximately 15 percent of the world's infant formulas are made in Ireland. Within the infant nutrition work package, oligosaccharides are one area where research is being conducted at multiple universities," noted Bleiel.
A carbohydrate that is plentiful in human milk, oligosaccharides are not readily prevalent in cows' milk. FHI's team is studying how to make cows' milk more closely mirror the composition of human milk.
Dairy's role in healthy aging also draws attention from FHI researchers. Most recently, milk constituents, including protein and vitamins, were combined into a composite supplement to study lean tissue mass in the elderly population.
"Researchers tracked 160 elderly individuals for six months and measured lean tissue over that time. About 2 pounds of lean tissue mass were accrued during that time compared to the control group. In the end, it proved to be a supplement that could improve this age group's mobility and quality of life," concluded Bleiel.
(c) Hoard's Dairyman Intel 2015
July 6, 2015
