Evaluation of the effect of somatic cell counts on casein proteolysis in ovine milk cheese by means of capillary electrophoresis.

The primary proteolysis of ewe's cheeses made from milk with different somatic cell counts (5CC) included three groups of study: cheeses made with milk with less than 500,000 somatic cells (SC); with milk containing 1 x 10(6) to 1.5 x 10(6) SC, the normal range for ewe's milk; and with milk containing more than 3.106 SC. These were examined by capillary eledrophoresis. Intact caseins as alpha(s1)-CN (I, II, and III), alpha(s2)-CN, and beta-CN (beta, beta1, and beta2) were identified. Some peptides resulting from casein proteolysis as gamma-CN and l-alpha(s1)-CN were also identified. The study reveals that proteolysis increased with ripening time and the extent of casein degradation depended on the content in SC, showing that residual intact casein, both alpha(s1)-CN and beta-CN, decreased as the SCC of milk increased because of their higher proteolytic enzyme levels. The proteolysis pattern indicated that several enzymes were implicated in increased proteolysis in high SCC cheeses.