“…The closest homolog to KLU with a described catalytic activity is the maize CYP78A1 protein, which, in vitro, catalyzes omega-hydroxylation of a fatty acid (Imaishi et al, 2000). Also, eight of the nine cytochrome P450 genes that are transcriptionally regulated by KLU activity (CYP76C1, 76C2, 76C3, 76C4, 81F3, 86A4, 86A7, and 94B1) are linked to fattyacid modification: omega-hyroxylation of fatty acids has been directly shown for CYP86A4 and CYP86A7 (Duan and Schuler, 2005), whereas CYPs 76C1, 76C2, 76C3, 76C4, 81F3, and 94B1 are all closely related to proteins for which fatty-acid hydroxylation has been shown (Cabello-Hurtado et al, 1998;Pinot et al, 2000;Tamaki et al, 2005). The homology to CYP78A1 and the concerted regulation of these genes by KLU suggest that KLU itself modifies a fatty-acid-related molecule, which could then feedback regulate other enzymatic activities in a biosynthetic pathway.…”