Overview
Levkov and colleagues measured major and trace elements in raw ewes’ milk from six regions in the Republic of Macedonia. This is direct dairy-occurrence evidence in wet-weight mg/kg units, with regional variation linked by the authors to differing anthropogenic pressures.
Key numbers
Table 2 reports trace-element concentrations in raw ewes’ milk, mg/kg wet weight. For the averaged regional rows, the source reports:
| Region | Al | Ba | Cu | Fe | Mn | Sr | Zn |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sv. Nikole | 1.12 ± 0.27 | 0.21 ± 0.04 | 1.33 ± 0.14 | 1.86 ± 0.24 | 0.05 ± 0.01 | 0.92 ± 0.19 | 3.67 ± 0.66 |
| Sasa | 1.30 ± 0.52 | 0.91 ± 0.61 | 1.00 ± 0.27 | 2.31 ± 1.31 | 0.09 ± 0.04 | 0.72 ± 0.22 | 4.44 ± 1.59 |
| Veles | 1.58 ± 0.45 | 0.21 ± 0.03 | 1.07 ± 0.13 | 2.85 ± 0.31 | 0.06 ± 0.02 | 0.54 ± 0.15 | 4.99 ± 1.56 |
| Mariovo | 1.11 ± 0.16 | 0.37 ± 0.05 | 0.76 ± 0.11 | 1.94 ± 0.59 | 0.07 ± 0.01 | 0.72 ± 0.13 | 3.76 ± 0.91 |
The single Bistra sample reports Al 2.26 mg/kg, Ba 0.382 mg/kg, Co 0.57 mg/kg, Cu 0.93 mg/kg, Fe 3.38 mg/kg, Mn 0.16 mg/kg, Ni 0.18 mg/kg, Sr 0.26 mg/kg, and Zn 3.89 mg/kg. Ag, As, Cd, and Pb were below the reported detection cutoffs in the tabulated samples.
The abstract reports major-element ranges of Ca 1131-2070 mg/kg, Mg 98.3-183 mg/kg, Na 223-400 mg/kg, and P 569-1080 mg/kg.
Methods (brief)
The authors collected raw ewes’ milk from households in Sv. Nikole, Sasa, Veles, Mariovo, Skopje, and Bistra. Seventeen elements were measured after microwave digestion by ICP-AES. Results are reported on a wet-weight basis and discussed against regional anthropogenic pressure, including mining and smelting influence.
Implications
Certification: This is direct dairy occurrence evidence, but the matrix is raw ewes’ milk rather than packaged consumer dairy products.
Courses: Useful case for showing how upstream mining and smelting context can appear in raw-milk trace-element profiles.
App: Context for dairy ingredient exposure patterns, especially for metals reported above detection in wet-weight milk.
Wiki pages this source may touch
Verification notes
Recovered from skip:incomplete-metadata during the 2026-06-11 recovery fire. DOI was not visible in the extracted text, but the PDF contains direct wet-weight occurrence data for raw ewes’ milk and is in-scope lane a1 evidence.
Update history
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