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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Columbia, Missouri » Plant Genetics Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #173524
Title: THE PRODUCTION OF VEGETABLE OILS WITH NOVEL PROPERTIES: USING GENOMIC TOOLS TO PROBE AND MANIPULATE PLANT FATTY ACID METABOLISM

Author
item CAHOON, EDGAR
item KINNEY, ANTHONY - DEPONT-PIONEER HIBRED

Submitted to: European Journal of Lipid Science and Technology
Publication Type: Review Article
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/31/2005
Publication Date: 4/15/2005
Citation: Cahoon, E.B., Kinney, A.J. 2005. The production of vegetable oils with novel properties: using genomic tools to probe and manipulate plant fatty acid metabolism. European Journal of Lipid Science and Technology. 107:239-243.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Plant genomics has provided useful approaches for the identification of genes to improve the functional properties of vegetable oils for industrial applications. Among the most significant of these approaches is expressed sequence tag (EST) analysis, which involves the mass sequencing of randomly selected cDNAs prepared from plant cells. Hundreds of unusual fatty acids occur in the seed oils of plants, most of which are not well-suited for agronomic production. Many of these fatty acids have desirable industrial properties, and as such, the ability to transfer the biosynthetic pathways for these fatty acids to established crops offers a means of increasing the value of conventional vegetable oils. As a component of such metabolic engineering efforts, EST analysis has proven to be a valuable tool for the rapid discovery of genes associated with the biosynthesis of unusual fatty acids in seeds of non-agronomic species. This method has been particularly effective in cases where the biosynthetic pathway of an unusual fatty acid is not well-defined. Through the use of EST analysis, cDNAs encoding novel and biochemically interesting fatty acid modifying enzymes have been discovered. These include enzymes that introduce conjugated double bonds, epoxy residues and hydroxyl residues into fatty acids, as well as enzymes that elongate fatty acids and introduce double bonds into novel positions in acyl chains. cDNAs encoding a number of these enzymes have been introduced into soybean seeds to generate oils with potentially useful industrial properties.