Studies on Avian Fat Composition: 1. Effect of Dietary Fat on the Fatty Acids of the Triglyceride and Phospholipid Fractions of the Blood Plasma and Adipose Tissue Lipids of the Laying Hen

Abstract

THE fatty acid composition of body fats is primarily influenced by dietary fatty acids and results from highly specific and controlled metabolic reactions which not only concern the influence of one fatty acid on the distribution of other fatty acids, but also the position of the fatty acids on the glycerol molecule according to Barbour (1933) and Tove (1960).Animal fats may contain more than 35 fatty acids as was reported by Insull and Ahrens (1959), but six usually comprise more than 90% of the fatty acid composition of animal depot fats. The acids are myristic, palmitic, and stearic of the saturated acid series, and palmitoleic, oleic, and linoleic of the unsaturated series.The relative constancy of the fatty acid composition of ruminant fat as reported by Shorland (1950), resulted in the theory that the nature of the dietary fats did not appreciably modify the depot fats, however, most animals,…