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Comprehensive analysis of phospholipids in the brain, heart, kidney, and liver: brain phospholipids are least enriched with polyunsaturated fatty acids

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Abstract

It is commonly accepted that brain phospholipids are highly enriched with long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs). However, the evidence for this remains unclear. We used HPLC–MS to analyze the content and composition of phospholipids in rat brain and compared it to the heart, kidney, and liver. Phospholipids typically contain one PUFA, such as 18:2, 20:4, or 22:6, and one saturated fatty acid, such as 16:0 or 18:0. However, we found that brain phospholipids containing monounsaturated fatty acids in the place of PUFAs are highly elevated compared to phospholipids in the heart, kidney, and liver. The relative content of phospholipid containing PUFAs is ~ 60% in the brain, whereas it is over 90% in other tissues. The most abundant species of phosphatidylcholine (PC) is PC(16:0/18:1) in the brain, whereas PC(18:0/20:4) and PC(16:0/20:4) are predominated in other tissues. Moreover, several major species of plasmanyl and plasmenyl phosphatidylethanolamine are found to contain monounsaturated fatty acid in the brain only. Overall, our data clearly show that brain phospholipids are the least enriched with PUFAs of the four major organs, challenging the common belief that the brain is highly enriched with PUFAs.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge Dr. Edmund Miller for his comments and helpful advice in writing the manuscript. This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [RO1HL067630 and S10RR027878].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Linus Pauling Institute, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA

    Jaewoo Choi & Jan F. Stevens

  2. Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA

    Jan F. Stevens

  3. Department of Emergency Medicine, Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, Northwell Health System, 350 Community Dr, Manhasset, NY, 11030, USA

    Tai Yin, Koichiro Shinozaki, Joshua W. Lampe, Lance B. Becker & Junhwan Kim

  4. Department of Molecular Medicine, Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell, Hempstead, NY, USA

    Joshua W. Lampe & Junhwan Kim

  5. Department of Emergency Medicine, Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell, Hempstead, NY, USA

    Lance B. Becker

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  1. Jaewoo Choi
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Correspondence to Junhwan Kim.

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Choi, J., Yin, T., Shinozaki, K. et al. Comprehensive analysis of phospholipids in the brain, heart, kidney, and liver: brain phospholipids are least enriched with polyunsaturated fatty acids. Mol Cell Biochem 442, 187–201 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11010-017-3203-x

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