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Food Lipids: Chemistry, Nutrition, and Biotechnology

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II. LIPASES FROM DIFFERENT SOURCES<br />

A. Animals<br />

Lipases from various organs <strong>and</strong> tissues of several mammalian species have been<br />

investigated, but human <strong>and</strong> other pancreatic lipases are the most thoroughly studied.<br />

Pancreatic lipases are secreted into the duodenum <strong>and</strong> active on dietary triacylglycerols.<br />

They are a class of structurally similar 50-kDa glycoproteins that are characterized<br />

by their specificity toward triacylglycerols with little or no activity toward<br />

phospholipids, activation at the oil (substrate)–water interface <strong>and</strong> by colipase, <strong>and</strong><br />

inhibition at micellar concentrations of bile salts. Pancreatic lipase can catalyze the<br />

complete breakdown of triacylglycerols to free fatty acids <strong>and</strong> glycerol. Nonhuman<br />

pancreatic lipases may differ from corresponding human lipases; for example, guinea<br />

pig pancreatic lipase differs in that it exhibits phospholipase A activity (1).<br />

Other mammalian lipases have been studied <strong>and</strong>, while similar, they exhibit<br />

some characteristics that differ from those of pancreatic lipase. In addition to pancreatic<br />

lipase, fat digestion is aided by a series of lingual, pharyngeal, <strong>and</strong> gastric<br />

lipases that may be responsible for up to 50% of dietary fat breakdown (2). Highly<br />

stable at low pH, these enzymes are activated by bile salts <strong>and</strong> show a preference<br />

for the sn-3 position of the substrate. Human lipoprotein lipase, which functions in<br />

hydrolyzing triacylglycerols in chylomicrons <strong>and</strong> very low density lipoproteins,<br />

shows many similarities to pancreatic lipase (e.g., high sequence homology, presence<br />

of the lid). However, this lipase is not responsive to colipase but instead requires<br />

apolipoprotein C-II (apoC-II) for activity, functions as a dimer, <strong>and</strong> is activated by<br />

heparin (3–5). Hepatic lipase is confined to the liver, where it also is involved in<br />

the metabolism of lipoproteins, but it is not activated by apoC-II (6). Human milk<br />

lipase, which functions in the digestion of milk fat ingested by infants, is activated<br />

by bile salt (7).<br />

B. Plants<br />

Plant lipases have not received the same attention as those from other sources, but<br />

they have been reviewed recently by Mukherjee <strong>and</strong> Hills (8). Oilseed lipases have<br />

been of greatest interest among the plant lipases, <strong>and</strong> those from a variety of plant<br />

species show differences in their substrate specificity, pH optima, reactivity toward<br />

sulfhydryl reagents, hydrophobicity, <strong>and</strong> subcellular location (9). These lipases are<br />

relatively specific for the native triacylglycerols of the species from which they were<br />

isolated. They are absent from the ungerminated seed <strong>and</strong> formed during germination.<br />

C. Microbes<br />

There is substantial current interest in developing microbial lipases for use in biomedical<br />

<strong>and</strong> industrial applications because of their versatility <strong>and</strong> availability; in<br />

addition, they can be produced less expensively than corresponding mammalian enzymes.<br />

Hou <strong>and</strong> Johnston (10) screened 1229 bacteria, yeasts, actinomycetes, <strong>and</strong><br />

fungi <strong>and</strong> found that about 25% were lipase positive. Microbial lipases that have<br />

received the greatest attention are inducible, extracellular enzymes having properties<br />

that are generally similar to those of human pancreatic lipase, despite differences in<br />

detail. At least some of the microbes produce a mixture of extracellular lipases<br />

formed from multiple genes (11–15) <strong>and</strong> some lipases vary by degrees of glycosyl-<br />

Copyright 2002 by Marcel Dekker, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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