Gestational diabetes mellitus decreases placental uptake of long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids: involvement of long-chain acyl-CoA synthetase

The influence of placental metabolism on fatty acid transfer to the fetus

“…The model development, parameter sensitivity, and analysis of transfer mechanisms were first performed using data from an initial experiment with 90 min of 13 C-fatty acid infusion followed by a 30 min washout. Once the computational model was derived for this case, the same modeling methodology was applied to estimate the model parameters based on the data from the 180 min 13 Cfatty acid infusion + 30 min washout experiments (n = 6).…”

“…Once the computational model was derived for this case, the same modeling methodology was applied to estimate the model parameters based on the data from the 180 min 13 Cfatty acid infusion + 30 min washout experiments (n = 6).…”

“…T perf = 180 min is the experimental 13 C-fatty acid perfusion time for the six experiments. The mass balance for 13 C-fatty acid is b tra = u  d. If b = 0, the entire amount of 13 C-fatty acid taken up by the placenta was delivered to the fetal circulation.…”

“…T perf = 180 min is the experimental 13 C-fatty acid perfusion time for the six experiments. The mass balance for 13 C-fatty acid is b tra = u  d. If b = 0, the entire amount of 13 C-fatty acid taken up by the placenta was delivered to the fetal circulation. If b > 0, a certain amount of 13 C-fatty acid was taken up by the placenta but not delivered to the fetal circulation and thus had to be retained by by long-chain fatty acid acyl-CoA synthetase in the cytosol or, for the fatty acid transport protein family of membrane transporters, is directly associated with the membrane transport protein (13,14).…”

“…Thereafter, the maternal circulation was established at a flow rate of 8.4 ml/min, and both circulations were kept in the open circuit mode for 30 min. The maternal reservoir was changed to 200 ml perfusion medium containing 0.5% essential fatty acid-free BSA (Sigma-Aldrich, Schnelldorf, Germany) and 13 C-fatty acid (37.2 µM 16:0, 40.5 µM 18:1, 1.6 µM 18:2 n6) (SigmaAldrich, Schnelldorf, Germany) and unlabeled fatty acids (0.78 µM 20:4 n6, 0.2 µM 20:5 n3) (Sigma-Aldrich, Schnelldorf, Germany). The fetal circulation contained 0.5% BSA as an acceptor for fatty acids and was kept in open-circuit mode throughout the experiment.…”