Intramolecular Fatty Acid Distribution in the Milk Fat Triglycerides of Several Species

Absorption of Fat and Calcium by Infants Fed a Milk-Based Formula Containing Palm Olein

“…There is good evidence that it is absorbed intact [14]. The excellent absorption of human milk fat [15], despite its high content of palmitic acid (22% of fatty acids), is generally attributed to the fact that 70% of the palmitic acid in human milk fat is present in the sn-2 position [1,2]. On the other hand, the efficiency of absorption of free fatty acids liberated from the sn-1 and sn-3 positions depends on the nature of the fatty acids.…”

“…Palm oil is one of the few plant oils that are rich in palmitic acid. However, contrary to human milk fat, in which palmitic acid is esterified predominantly in the sn-2 position [1,2], in palm oil palmitic acid is esterified predominantly in the sn-1 and sn-3 positions [3]. When present predominantly in the sn-1 and sn-3 positions, palmitic acid is known to be absorbed to a lesser degree by rats [4,5] and human infants [6,7] than when it is present predominantly in the sn-2 position.…”

Human Pancreatic Digestive Enzymes

“…Some plant species contain triglycerides with medium-chain fatty acids, usually unsaturated. Milk fat triglycerides of all mammals include variable percentages of short-and medium-chain fatty acids [78][79][80]. Phospholipids invariably contain 2 long-chain fatty acids, 1 saturated and 1 unsaturated [75].…”

The Composition of Human Milk as a Model for the Design of Infant Formulas: Recent Findings and Possible Applications

“…Palmitic acid constitutes about 22 YO of mature human milk lipids and 70-75 % of it is esterified at the sn-2 position (P-position) of the triacylglycerol (Freeman et al 1965;Christie, 1986;Martin et al 1993). The palmitic acid in vegetable oils commonly used in infant formulas and in chicken egg, on the other hand, is predominantly esterified at the sn-1 and sn-3 positions (Freeman et al 1965;Tomarelli et al 1968;Christie, 1986). Pancreatic colipase dependent lipase selectively hydrolyses the fatty acids at the sn-l and sn-3 positions, yielding free fatty acids and a 2-monoacylglycerol (Bernback et al 1990).…”