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Home >> Plant Biotechnology and Genomics >> Genetically Modified-GM Crops and Floricultural Plants >> Proportion of Desired Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids PUFAs


Proportion of desired polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs)

A desired fatty acid may be made to constitute 30-40% of the seed-oil, but further increase in the level of such a novel fatty acid has been difficult. Single gene insertions have actually been shown to alter the fatty acid (e.g., lauric acid) composition in rapeseed. Transfer of another gene encoding sn-2 acyltransferase led to increase of this fatty acid to 60%. However, even this high level of desired fatty acid may be inadequate.

For instance, there is a demand in rapeseed for increasing the erucic acid content from 50% to 90% of total seed oil, which is difficult to achieve (although for edible oil, low or zero erucic acid is desired, but. for industrial purposes, high level of erucic acid is necessary).

However, in castorbean, varieties are available where a single fatty acid constitutes up to 90% of seed oil, suggesting that it is not impossible to achieve this level in rapeseed and other seed oil crops

 

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