We are working on a device to measure fat in milk through NIR Spectroscopy. But no light (12W tungsten lamp) could pass even through 0.5mm milk. Is there any way to reduce the turbidity of the milk by dissolving proteins?
I am aware of the trypsin method to hydrolyze proteins, but is there any other inorganic chemical (which is more robust, insensitive to low temperature and fast)? Is EDTA method superior to Trypsin in terms of dissolving proteins?
Adding say 100 microliters of a 10% EDTA solution will disperse the micellar casein protein and render its scattering contribution negligible but you will still have a considerable scattering (turbidity) contribution from the fat globules. Percentage wise milk has about twice as much fat as casein protein. You may simply have to reduce you path length from your current 5 mm, to get sufficient light through for your purposes.
@William
It would dilute the % of fat and protein to much and attenuate the signal.
reduce the pH to 4.5 and separate the precipitated casein using centrifuge at low speed and use the whey for fat determination
I think you can also try to disperse casein micelles by adding an urea sol. (3g. 3M or 7M), but this can't overcome the turbidity contribution of fat globules.
Dr. Martins, Thats exactly what I wanted- Turbidity reduction only due to proteins. Thanks a lot.
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