Professional laboratory milk progesterone assay service and counselling
Estonian University of Life Sciences
Service description
Focus groups
– Universities, research institutes and companies
Focus areas
– Research on reproductive function of cattle.
– Reproductive management of cattle (early detection of non-pregnant cows, detection of commencement of luteal activity, detection of abnormal oestrous cycles, measuring efficiency and accuracy of detection of estrus, identification of inseminations performed at wrong time).
Counselling
We give advice on interpretation of results and how to best use milk progesterone analysis for the fertility management of cattle.
Method
Milk progesterone is analyzed by using a monoclonal antibody based quantitative enzyme immunoassay (EIA). The advantage of the EIA is that the changing of milk fat concentrations does not affect assay results, thus allowing precise analysis of progesterone from milk samples with different milk-fat concentrations. The EIA is internationally recognized as a gold standard and a research tool in studying reproductive function in dairy, beef and Tanzanian zebu cattle.