Abstract
The cDNA of the delta-12 fatty acid desaturase gene, IgFAD2, was cloned from the marine microalgae Isochrysis galbana, a species capable of producing docosahexaenoic acid. Sequence analysis indicated that the open reading frame measured a length of 1 158 bp and encoded 386 amino acids with a predicted molecular weight of 42.8 kDa and an isoelectric point of 9.2. Computational analysis of the protein sequence of IgFAD2 showed typical features of membrane-bound desaturase such as three conserved histidine boxes along with four membrane-spanning regions that were universally present among plant desaturases. Quantitative real-time PCR results showed that the abundance of IgFAD2 transcript was significantly upregulated under different environmental stresses including low temperature (15°C), high salinity (salinity of 62 and 93), and nitrogen starvation (220 μmol/L). Heterologous expression indicated that yeast cells transformed with a plasmid construct containing IgFAD2 could convert endogenous oleic acid (18:1Δ9, OA) into linoleic acid (18:2Δ9, 12, LA). These findings confirm that I. galbana IgFAD2 plays important roles in the biosynthetic pathways of unsaturated fatty acids.
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Foundation item: The Basic Scientific Fund for National Public Research Institutes of China under contract No. 2017Q09; the Aoshan Science and Technology Innovation Project of Pilot National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology (Qingdao) under contract No. 2016ASKJ02; the National Natural Science Foundation of China-Shandong Joint Funded Project under contract No. U1606404; the 973 Project from Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology under contract No. 2015CB755904; the National Natural Science Foundation of China under contract Nos 41776176 and 41806201; the Shandong Provincial Natural Science Foundation under contract No. ZR2015PD003.
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Han, X., Wang, S., Zheng, L. et al. Identification and characterization of a delta-12 fatty acid desaturase gene from marine microalgae Isochrysis galbana. Acta Oceanol. Sin. 38, 107–113 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-019-1354-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-019-1354-1