[The occurrence of goitrogenic substances in milk. 1. Release of goitrin in the milk of cows fed on rapeseed extract cakes].

A total of six cows, divided into 3 groups, were fed various amounts of rape cake containing 6 g of goitrin/kg over a period of 7 days. The cows were milked twice a day and the goitrin content of the heated milk samples were determined by a HPLC-method within 2 h. When rape cake was fed at 0.39, 1.9 and 3.9% resp. of the total feed this resulted in medium goitrin values of 37, 163 and 707 micrograms/l milk. These values correspond to a transfer of about 0.1% of the original progoitrin content in the feed. 12 h after the last rape feeding the amount of goitrin in the milk was below the detection limit of 7 ppb. The toxicological significance of these findings are dicussed.