Starvation-induced ketosis: reduction in dogs enriched with odd-carbon fatty acids.

Abstract

SummaryFor 13 weeks, a litter of weanling dogs was fed a nutritionally complete diet containing 40% of its calories as fat: cottonseed oil exclusively in the control group (three dogs) (C) and triundecanoin substituted for 50% of the fat calories in the experimental group (four dogs) (E). In E, 23% of the total adipose tissue fatty acids were odd numbered. Throughout an 8-day fast, serum glucose concentration was maintained significantly higher in E than in C. Blood acetoacetate and betahydroxy-butyrate were significantly lower in E than in C. On the eighth day of fasting, a greater mobilizable liver glycogen reserve was found in E. Thus, ketogenesis during fasting is strikingly inhibited in the odd-carbon-enriched animal. This inhibition is thought to relate directly to maintenance during starvation of blood glucose and insulin concentrations at appreciably higher values than is usual.