The influence of maize oil on the fatty acid composition of tissues of calves with and without vitamin E

Abstract

1. Fatty acid levels were studied in the tissues of 1-week-old calves receiving maize oil (in filled milk) with and without supplementary α-tocopherol. The calves that were not given vitamin E developed muscular dystrophy.2. Decreased amounts of linoleic acid and increased amounts of arachidonic acid were found in nearly all the lipid fractions of skeletal muscles, hearts, livers and kidneys of vitamin E-deficient calves. The concentration of the polyunsaturated fatty acids beyond arachidonic acid remained about the same in both groups. There was a significant decrease of 20:2Ω6 fatty acid in the phosphatidy1 choline, phosphatidy1 ethanolamine and free fatty acid fractions in the livers and kidneys of vitamin E-deficient calves.3. It is suggested that vitamin E has an inhibitory effect on the desaturating but not on the chain-elongation enzymes of microsomes in the liver and kidney.4. Maize-oil feeding had only a slight effect on erythrocyte fatty acid composition, and the erythrocyte haemolysis test was negative even in the vitamin E-deficient animals.