Metabolic engineering of hydroxy fatty acid production in plants: RcDGAT2 drives dramatic increases in ricinoleate levels in seed oil.

ABSTRACT:

Summary

A central goal of green chemistry is to produce industrially useful fatty acids in oilseed crops. Although genes encoding suitable fatty acid-modifying enzymes are available from many wild species, progress has been limited because the expression of these genes in transgenic plants produces low yields of the desired products. For example, Ricinus communis fatty acid hydroxylase 12 (FAH12) produces a maximum of only 17% hydroxy fatty acids (HFAs) when expressed in Arabidopsis. cDNA clones encoding R. communis enzymes for additional steps in the seed oil biosynthetic pathway were identified. Expression of these cDNAs in FAH12 transgenic plants revealed that the R. communis type-2 acyl-coenzyme A:diacylglycerol acyltransferase (RcDGAT2) could increase HFAs from 17% to nearly 3

SUBMITTER: Burgal J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2908398 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature