Very long chain fatty acids (VLCFAs) are involved in plant development and particularly in several cellular processes such as membrane trafficking, cell division and cell differentiation. However, the precise role of VLCFAs in these different cellular processes is still poorly understood in plants. In order to identify new factors associated with the biosynthesis or function of VLCFAs, a yeast ...

Various post transcriptional gene silencing strategies have been developed and exploited to study gene function or engineer disease resistance. The recently developed artificial microRNA strategy is an alternative method of effectively silencing target genes. The Δ12-desaturase (FAD2), Fatty acid elongase (FAE1), and Fatty acyl-ACP thioesterase B (FATB) were targeted with amiR159b-based constru...

Background: Evidence on the effects of lifestyle interventions on plasma fatty acid composition in children is limited. Objective: We investigated the effects of a dietary and physical activity intervention on plasma fatty acid composition of cholesteryl esters (CEs) and phospholipids and estimated desaturase and elongase activities in children. Design:We conducted a 2-y controlled dietary and ...

Fatty acids are important regulators in the control of mammalian energy homeostasis. They are ingested in the diet but a significant amount are also endogenously produced by de novo lipogenesis. Fatty acid elongation beyond 16 carbons (palmitic acid) can occur to generate very long chain fatty acids (VLCFA), a process that is initiated by the rate-limiting condensation reaction. To date, six ma...

Background. To determine the effect of consumption high-oleic sunflower oil on content and biosynthesis energy polyunsaturated (PUFA) fatty acids in rat liver lipids.
 Methods. Rats received a semi-synthetic fat-free diet which 5 % or 15 starch was replaced with high oleic oil. One group rats regular (high linoleic) The duration feeding 30 days. Liver lipids were divided into three fractio...

A number of epidemiologic studies have indicated a strong association between dietary fat intake and prostate cancer development, suggesting that lipid metabolism plays some important roles in prostate carcinogenesis and its progression. In this study, through our genome-wide gene expression analysis of clinical prostate cancer cells, we identified a novel lipogenic gene, ELOVL7, coding a possi...

Mutations in the gene ELOVL4 have been shown to cause stargardt-like macular dystrophy. ELOVL4 is part of a family of fatty acid elongases and is yet to have a specific elongase activity assigned to it. We generated Elovl4 Y270X mutant mice and characterized the homozygous mutant as well as homozygous Elovl4 knockout mice in order to better understand the function or role of Elovl4. We found th...

Elovl-6, a long fatty acid elongase, contributes to de novo synthesis of fatty acids and regulates hepatic insulin sensitivity. Hepatic regulation of Elovl-6 gene expression in various nutritional conditions suggested that, like other lipogenic enzyme genes, Elovl-6 is a target of SREBP-1, a transcription factor governing fatty acid synthesis. Supportively, adenoviral RNAi knockdown of SREBP-1 ...

Genomic DNA of Ostreococcus tauri, a fully sequenced marine unicellular alga from the phytoplankton, was used to amplify a gene coding for a typical front-end desaturase involved in polyunsaturated fatty acid biosynthesis. Heterologous expression in Saccharomyces cerevisiae revealed very high desaturation activity with Delta6-regioselectivity. Short-time kinetic experiments showed that the desa...