Analytical characterization of 2-bromo-palmitic acid by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry as a tool for analysis of lipid metabolism in fish

Abstract

Elucidation of the lipid metabolism of aquatic organisms is important for the progress of aquaculture and its related research activities. 2-Bromo-palmitic acid has been introduced as a metabolically stable inducer of differentiation of adipose tissues [1] and a regulatory factor (inhibitor) in the palmitoylation process of protein dynamics [2–4]. These papers have shown that metabolic or dynamic regulation by the brominated fatty acid is successful. Therefore, it is suggested that 2-bromo-palmitic acid has a significant advantage as a tool for experiments in further investigations on aquatic organisms such as previously described reports showing lipid metabolism in fish [5, 6], in which the detection of the brominated fatty acid will be necessary to infer the potential of this fatty acid as a nonmetabolizable regulatory factor. However, the quantitative properties of the brominated fatty acid have not been elucidated. Thus, this study aims to obtain the analytical profiles of 2-bromo-palmitic acid related to gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS). We investigated whether 2-bromo-palmitic acid methyl ester (2-BrC16:0ME) is derived from 2-bromo-palmitic acid, and how the brominated fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) is detected by GC–