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German scientists searching for a sustainable source of medically important polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) have shown they can be manufactured by soil-dwelling bacteria.
Research is ongoing to pinpoint who would benefit most from taking a fish oil supplement but there’s no denying that PUFAs – the good fats in fish and fish oil – have clear health benefits. However, overfishing, climate change and ocean acidification have left global fish populations, and supplies of high quality fish oil, in decline.
Rolf Müller and colleagues at Saarland University have identified that certain species of myxobacteria, also known as slime bacteria after the slime they produce to aid their movement, have the genes to synthesise certain omega-3 long-chain PUFAs de novo by employing enzymes known as PUFA synthases.
Read the full article in Chemistry World»
Read the original journal article in Chemical Science:
Polyunsaturated fatty acid biosynthesis in myxobacteria: Different PUFA synthases and their product diversity
Katja Gemperlein, Shwan Rachid, Ronald O. Garcia, Silke C. Wenzel and Rolf Mueller
Chem. Sci., 2013, Accepted Manuscript, DOI: 10.1039/C3SC53163E, Edge Article
