Cholinephosphotransferase and Diacylglycerol Acyltransferase (Substrate Specificities at a Key Branch Point in Seed...

Many oilseed plants accumulate triacylglycerols that contain unusual fatty acyl structures rather than the common 16- and 18-carbon fatty acids found in membrane lipids of these plants. In vitro experiments demonstrate that triacylglycerols are synthesized via diacylglycerols in microsomal preparations and that this same sub-cellular fraction is the site for the synthesis of phosphatidylcholine, which in seeds is synthesized from diacylglycerol by CDP-choline: diacylglycerol cholinephosphotransferase. In microsomes from Cuphea lanceolata, a plant that accumulates fatty acids with 10 carbons and no double bonds (10:0) in its oil, the diacylglycerol acyltransferase exhibited 4-fold higher activity with 10:0/10:0 molecular species of diacylglycerol than with molecular species containing 18-carbon fatty acids. In castor bean (Ricinus communis), which accumulates oil containing ricinoleic acid, diricinoleoyldiacylglycerol was the favored substrate for triacylglycerol synthesis. In contrast to these modest specificities of the diacylglycerol acyltransferases, the cholinephosphotransferases from these plants and from safflower (Carthamus tinctorius) and rapeseed (Brassica napus) showed little or no specificity across a range of different diacylglycerol substrates. Consideration of these results and other data suggests that the targeting of unusual fatty acids to triacylglycerol synthesis and their exclusion from membrane lipids are not achieved on the basis of the diacylglycerol substrate specificities of the enzymes involved and may instead require the spatial separation of two different diacylglycerol pools.