General aim:
To provide the scientific basis for recommendations on how to better control variability in milk and dairy iodine content to achieve a specified range of iodine concentration optimal for human iodine intakes by target groups in Switzerland, thus avoiding both iodine deficiency and iodine excess.
Specific Aims:
I) To quantify the main dietary factors influencing iodine content of the milk of cows.
II) To identify and apportion iodine sources and causes for iodine losses in Swiss dairy farming.
III) To identify and apportion potential iodine losses in processing of dairy products.
IV) To quantify human iodine absorption from milk and dairy products and compare it to absorption from iodized salt.
This project will be carried out as a collaboration with partners from the human nutrition (M.B. Zimmermann, I. Herter-Aeberli) and animal nutrition (M. Kreuzer, J. Bérard) groups at ETH Zurich, Agroscope Institute for Food Sciences (D. Wechsler, E. Jakob) and Agroscope Institute for Livestock Sciences (P. Schlegel).
Comments: We apply for funding for a PhD thesis here. However, as the entire project is quite large and as we were requested to reduce the budget by 30% for this application, we have made some adaptations to the original proposal. In each project part described hereafter, the essential changes made on the original proposal are explained. One major point is, that we will apply for additional funding for this research topic within the Coop Research Program. This program allows the financing of a two year Postdoc project. We are currently preparing an application around the topic of dose response (in cows, dairy products and humans) with a special focus on organic production methods which we plan to submit this fall. This will allow us to use some synergies between the two projects and thereby reduce costs. Further, the greater experience of a Postdoc will help the PhD student especially in the practical aspects of planning and carrying out the animal and human studies.