Abstract
Most bacteria construct their phospholipid membrane with fatty acids made from type II fatty acid synthesis system (FASII). FASII consists of dissociable enzymes that grow and modify a fatty acid chain before transferring it to the membrane. FASII produces acyl chains varying in the number of carbons and the degree of saturation which enables bacteria to adjust the biophysical properties of the membrane in response to environmental flux. Here we discuss the biochemical steps and genetic regulation of the prokaryotic FASII system, highlighting similarities and differences in the biosynthetic pathways of gram-negative and gram-positive organisms. The initiation and elongation modules discuss the nascent chain's production and modification while the acyltransfer and phospholipid modules discuss fatty acid transfer to the phospholipid membrane. We detail the importance of bacterial lipid metabolism research due to its involvement in biofuel synthesis and biomedical research.
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