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. 2025 Jul 22:29:102798.
doi: 10.1016/j.fochx.2025.102798. eCollection 2025 Jul.

Lipidomics profile shows differences of polar lipids between donkey and bovine colostrum: a comparative study

Yumeng Zhang  1 , Jiali Chen  1 , Zhenmin Liu  2 , Shengyi Zhang  1 , Jiale Wang  1 , Junhua Shao  1 , Xiqing Yue  1 , Mohan Li  1   2   3
Affiliations

Lipidomics profile shows differences of polar lipids between donkey and bovine colostrum: a comparative study

Yumeng Zhang et al. Food Chem X. .

Abstract

Donkey colostrum (DC) is recognized as a valuable nutritional source; however, its extremely low lipid content (especially polar lipids) demands lipid supplementation during processing through the addition of fish oils, vegetable oils, or functional lipids. Therefore, a comprehensive characterization of polar lipids in both DC and bovine colostrum (BC) is required. In this study, totally 11 subclasses of 206 polar lipids in DC and BC were characterized. Using rigorous screening criteria (VIP > 1, P < 0.05, and fold change >2 or < 0.5), 141 lipid species were identified as having significantly different polar lipids (SDPLs) between DC and BC. Subsequent investigations revealed six key lipid metabolic pathways, with the glycerophospholipid metabolism being the most critical. These findings substantially enhance our understanding of the polar lipid differences between DC and BC, while providing a theoretical basis for synergistic utilization of the two milk sources to optimize nutritional enrichment strategies.

Keywords: Bovine colostrum; Donkey colostrum; Glycerophospholipid metabolism; Lipidomics; Polar lipids.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Unlabelled Image
Graphical abstract
Fig. 1
Fig. 1
The identified lipid numbers between positive ion modes (POS) and negative ion modes (NEG) (A). Number of lipid species identified in 11 lipid subclasses (B). Percentage composition of the content of each lipid subclass in DC or BC (C). DC = donkey colostrum; BC = bovine colostrum. PC, phosphatidylcholine; PE, phosphatidylethalomine; PI, phosphatidylinositol; PS, phosphatidylserine; PG, phosphatidylglycerol; PA, phosphatidic acid; CL, cardiolipin; SM, sphingomyelin; Cer, ceramide; Hex2Cer, dihexosylceramide; HexCer, hexosylceramide.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Comparison of each lipid subclass between DC and BC, the Y-axis indicates the concentration of lipids (ng/mL) (w/w). DC = donkey colostrum; BC = bovine colostrum. PC, phosphatidylcholine; PE, phosphatidylethalomine; PI, phosphatidylinositol; PS, phosphatidylserine; PG, phosphatidylglycerol; PA, phosphatidic acid; CL, cardiolipin; SM, sphingomyelin; Cer, ceramide; Hex2Cer, dihexosylceramide; HexCer, hexosylceramide. *** means P < 0.001.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Plot of principal component analysis (PCA) scores (A), orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) score plot (B), corresponding OPLS-DA validation (C) and volcano plot (D) for DC and BC. Heatmap analysis of 141 SDPLs between DC and BC (E). DC = donkey colostrum; BC = bovine colostrum; SDPLs: significantly different polar lipids; FC: fold change; VIP: variable importance in projection.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Spearman's correlation network (p < 1e-6) of 141 SDPLs in DC (A) and BC (B). Lipid species were color-coded into ten major lipid subclasses. The size of the circle represents the level of content. DC = donkey colostrum; BC = bovine colostrum; SDPLs: significantly different polar lipids. PC, phosphatidylcholine; PE, phosphatidylethalomine; PI, phosphatidylinositol; PS, phosphatidylserine; PG, phosphatidylglycerol; PA, phosphatidic acid; CL, cardiolipin; SM, sphingomyelin; Cer, ceramide; Hex2Cer, dihexosylceramide; HexCer, hexosylceramide.
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
KEGG pathway analysis of SDPLs between DC and BC (A). Metabolomic profiles of significantly different polar lipid metabolic pathways in DC and BC (B). DC = donkey colostrum; BC = bovine colostrum; SDPLs: significantly different polar lipids.
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