The administration of high-fat diets, during 40 days to adult rats, provoked specific variations on serum and thymus fatty acids, as a consequence of differences in FA profile of their lipid sources. These results reflect the impact that eating habits have on health status. It is important to put emphasis not only on the reduction of total fat intake, but also on choosing healthy sources of fat, replacing saturated fatty acids by polyunsaturated and including oils with higher content of ω3 to keep a balanced ω6/ω3 ratio.
Objectives
Fatty acids have an important role in nutrition. The objective was to analyze the effect of diet containing olive oil, with and without the supplementation with omega 3, on serum, thymus and brain's fatty acid profiles of growing rats.
Methods
Weanling Wistar rats fed during 10 days a diet containing olive oil as fat (O group). Other group received the same diet supplemented with 24mg/day of fish oil (OS group). Control group(C) received diet according AIN´93. Serum, thymus and brain's fatty acids profiles were determined by gas chromatography. Statistical analysis used ANOVA.
Results
Results (%Area) were expressed as the Mean ± SD: SERUM: OLEIC O:23.44 ± 3.68a; OS:18.31 ± 2.22a; C:10.60 ± 2.01b; LINOLEIC(LA) O:12.44 ± 1.65b; OS:12.98 ± 4.31b; C:18.27 ± 2.81a;
LINOLENIC(ALA) O:0.30 ± 0.09b; OS:0.32 ± 0.08b; C:0.92 ± 0.34a; EPA O:0.65 ± 0.17b; OS:1.63 ± 0.49a; C:0.80 ± 0.23b; DHA: O:1.57 ± 0.58b; OS:4.00 ± 1.70a; C:1.33 ± 0.19b. THYMUS: OLEIC O:21.54 ± 5.92; OS:24.40 ± 5.04; C:18.22 ± 3.23; LINOLEIC O:5.90 ± 0.56b; OS:6.50 ± 0.61b; C:10.89 ± 2.18a; ALA O:0.27 ± 0.02b; OS:0.30 ± 0.07b; C:0.49 ± 0.19a; EPA O:0.49 ± 0.28; OS:0.50 ± 0.13; C:0.50 ± 0.12; DHA O:0.47 ± 0.10b; OS:0.70 ± 0.12a; C:0.52 ± 0.16b. BRAIN: OLEIC O:13.11 ± 2.64; OS:12.94 ± 1.07; C:13.14 ± 1.56; LA O:1.17 ± 0.46; OS:1.05 ± 0.33; C:1.26 ± 0.19; ALA O:0.15 ± 0.03; OS:0.12 ± 0.04; C:0.16 ± 0.06; EPA O:0.46 ± 0.18; OS:0.38 ± 0.09; C:0.33 ± 0.07; DHA: O:11.39 ± 2.04; OS:11.32 ± 1.69; C:11.66 ± 1.63. Means with one letter (a, b) in common, were not significantly different (p > 0.05). In sera, O and OS showed lower ALA and LA and higher oleic levels, compared to C. OS presented high levels of EPA and DHA. In thymus, O and OS groups showed lower levels of ALA and LA than C. DHA only increased in the OS group. No changes were presented in the brain.
Conclusions
The results suggest that olive oil exacerbated omega-9 family with diminution of essential fatty acids while organism tries to sustain brain essential fatty acids. Fish oil supplementation increased serum and thymus DHA levels, not modifying low levels of other essential fatty acids. Another source of supplementation may be convenient to analyze.
Funding Sources
Supported by University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.