Isotopic data reported by Mead, Steinberg, and Howton in 1953 (1) and by Steinberg, Slaton, Howton, and Mead in 1956 (2) firmly established the incorporation of acetate and of linoleate, respectively, into arachidonic acid in the rat. Witten and Holman in 1952 (3) had suggested that pyridoxine stimulated this conversion. They had shown that rats deficient in essential fatty acids and in pyridox...

The liver has a large capacity for mitochondrial fatty acid β-oxidation, which is critical for systemic metabolic adaptations such as gluconeogenesis and ketogenesis. To understand the role of hepatic fatty acid oxidation in response to a chronic high-fat diet (HFD), we generated mice with a liver-specific deficiency of mitochondrial long-chain fatty acid β-oxidation (Cpt2L-/- mice). Paradoxica...

This study investigated the effects of a diet deficient in alpha-linolenic acid followed or not by supplementation with phospholipids rich in n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) on behavior and phospholipid fatty acid composition in selected brain regions. Three weeks before mating, two groups of mice were fed a semisynthetic diet containing both linoleic and alpha-linolenic acid or a diet d...

Interest in the n-3 fatty acids began some thirty years ago from the remarkable studies in the Greenland Eskimo by the Danish scientists, Dyerberg and Bang. These Eskimos had a low prevalence of coronary heart disease despite a high fat diet because their fat contained high proportions of n-3 fatty acids. This discovery stimulated a large amount of subsequent research about n-3 fatty acids as i...

In humans, the polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) linoleic acid (18:2 omega-6, or n-6) and alpha-linolenic (18:3 omega-3, or n3) are ’essential’ for normal growth and function; the only source is dietary. Research into the omega-3 series of essential polyunsaturated fatty acids stems from the observation that the native Inuit (Eskimo) of Greenland (who consume a traditional diet rich in fish oi...

BACKGROUND: Pregnancy in patients with lipoprotein lipase deficiency is associated with high risk of maternal pancreatitis and fetal death. A very low fat diet (< 10% of calories) is the primary treatment modality for the prevention of acute pancreatitis, a rare but potentially serious complication of severe hypertriglyceridemia. Since pregnancy can exacerbate hypertriglyceridemia in the geneti...

Medium-chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase (MCAD) deficiency is the most common inherited disorder of mitochondrial fatty acid beta-oxidation in humans. To better understand the pathogenesis of this disease, we developed a mouse model for MCAD deficiency (MCAD-/-) by gene targeting in embryonic stem (ES) cells. The MCAD-/- mice developed an organic aciduria and fatty liver, and showed profound cold in...