Hydrolysis of acyl-homogeneous and fish oil triacylglycerols using desalted midgut extract from atlantic salmon, Salmo salar.

Despite several studies aimed at evaluating the positional and fatty acid specificity of fish triacylglycerol (TAG) digestive lipases, there is still much uncertainty regarding these issues. The aim of the present study was therefore to address these questions in Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.). Crude luminal midgut extracts were collected from fed salmon and the hydrolysis studied for various substrates including triolein (Tri-18:1), trilinolein (Tri-18:2), trilinolenin (Tri-18:3), trieicosapentaenoin (Tri-20:5), tridocosahexaenoin (Tri-22:6) and natural fish oil TAG. Using Tri-18:1, in a time-curve model showed an initial high degree of sn-1 or sn-3 specificity where sn-1,2(2,3)-diacylglycerol (1,2(2,3)-DAG) and free fatty acid (FFA) were the main hydrolytic products up to 15 min. Lack of initial sn-2 specificity was confirmed by negligible sn-1,3-diacylglycerol (1,3-DAG) being produced. During the further hydrolysis of DAG, all positions appeared susceptible to attack causing a concomitantly small increase in sn-1(3)-monoacylglycerol (1(3)-MAG) and 2-MAG, but not at the level expected for an exclusively sn-1,3-specific lipase. Oleic acid (18:1n-9) and eicosapentaenoic acid (20:5n-3) were preferred substrates for hydrolysis using both fish oil and acyl-homogeneous TAGs with FFA as the main product of lipolysis. Hydrolysis of the natural fish oil TAG appeared slower yet produced proportionally more MAG and DAG after 5 min, and similar specificities, as for synthetic TAG substrates, were exhibited with 18:1n-9 and 20:5n-3 accumulating in the FFA fraction after 30 min. Notably, 16:0 was particularly conserved in MAG. As TAG resynthesis of absorbed lipid in salmon enterocytes proceeds preferably with 2-MAG as templates, the absorption of 2-MAG, produced during initial stages of TAG hydrolysis, would need to occur rapidly to be effectively utilised via the MAG pathway.