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•Experimental herds were established to examine the impact of high, medium or no pasture in the diet on a selection of fat soluble nutrients including β-carotene, lutein, retinol, α-tocopherol and zeaxanthin across an entire lactation.•High proportions of pasture resulted in significantly higher levels of target compounds, including > 2 fold increase in β-carotene on average across lactation.•These result offer significant insight into changes in these compounds throughout lactation in a spring calving pasture based dairy system, which can affect characteristics, such as colour, of final high fat dairy products.•A biomarker model was developed and successfully differentiated milk from each system, highlighting the potential of these products for future authentication purposes.

Over 1.2 billion people worldwide are affected by iron deficiency anaemia. While several strategies have been implemented to reduce the risk of iron deficiency, it remains a global public health challenge. Furthermore, iron deficiency presents in different forms, whereby absolute iron deficiency results from inadequate dietary iron intakes, but in a functional iron deficiency, the availability and utilisation of iron in the body is reduced due to underlying inflammation. Lactoferrin is a multifunctional protein, but its anti-inflammatory and iron-binding properties offer an interesting dual-purpose potential of supplying dietary iron, while counteracting one of the key barriers to iron absorption in inflammation. This article discusses the technofunctional properties of lactoferrin while highlighting recent evidence and discussion of its potential beneficial role in tackling the global challenge of iron deficiency.

Milk is a foodstuff widely consumed around the world originating from a variety of different species, animal management and production systems. In recent years, consumers have placed a much greater emphasis on the authenticity and origin of some food products often willing to pay a premium price for such products that is, for example ‘Grass-Fed Dairy’. Therefore, it is important to establish methods to assess both quality and authentication of milk and dairy products for increased food security and consumer protection. Accordingly, NMR-based, GC–MS-based, and LC–MS-based metabolomics have been established as useful tools in the analysis of dairy products, such as raw and processed milk. This short-review provides an updated and critical overview on the most useful metabolomics-based platforms and the most useful multivariate statistical tools available for metabolomic data interpretation.