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Metabolic engineering Camelina sativa with fish oil-like levels of DHA

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posted on 2023-05-19, 07:39 authored by Petrie, JR, Shrestha, P, Belide, S, Kennedy, Y, Lester, G, Liu, Q, Divi, UK, Mulder, RJ, Mansour, MP, Peter Nichols, Singh, SP

Background: Omega-3 long-chain (≥C20) polyunsaturated fatty acids (ω3 LC-PUFA) such as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosapentaenoic acid (DHA) are critical for human health and development. Numerous studies have indicated that deficiencies in these fatty acids can increase the risk or severity of cardiovascular, inflammatory and other diseases or disorders. EPA and DHA are predominantly sourced from marine fish although the primary producers are microalgae. Much work has been done to engineer a sustainable land-based source of EPA and DHA to reduce pressure on fish stocks in meeting future demand, with previous studies describing the production of fish oil-like levels of DHA in the model plant species, Arabidopsis thaliana.

Principal Findings: In this study we describe the production of fish oil-like levels (>12%) of DHA in the oilseed crop species Camelina sativa achieving a high ω3/ω6 ratio. The construct previously transformed in Arabidopsis as well as two modified construct versions designed to increase DHA production were used. DHA was found to be stable to at least the T5 generation and the EPA and DHA were found to be predominantly at the sn-1,3 positions of triacylglycerols. Transgenic and parental lines did not have different germination or seedling establishment rates.

Conclusions: DHA can be produced at fish oil-like levels in industrially-relevant oilseed crop species using multi-gene construct designs which are stable over multiple generations. This study has implications for the future of sustainable EPA and DHA production from land-based sources.

History

Publication title

PLoS One

Volume

9

Article number

e85061

Number

e85061

Pagination

1-8

ISSN

1932-6203

Department/School

Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies

Publisher

Public Library of Science

Place of publication

San Francisco, CA 94111 United States

Rights statement

? 2014 Petrie et al. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Repository Status

  • Open

Socio-economic Objectives

Expanding knowledge in the biological sciences

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