How do you think, could an increased amount of the unusual, especially monoenoic ones, fatty acids be a marker of evolutionary primitivity? Please, argue your opinion.
For example, I have found that the number of isomers of the hexadecenoic acid in the oils extracted from the arils and seeds of euonymus species was much higher in those species which are considered to be more evolutionary primitive than others. So, Euonymus japonicus (evergreen shrub) has up to five isomers of 16:1 acid compared only with 2 isomers in oils of E. alatus (deciduous shrub) (unpublished data). Moreover, the concentration of these unusual fatty acids in the oils of E. japonicus was also higher.
Where could I read about evolution of lipid metabolism? I think, it is very interesting area.
Any thoughts are strongly welcome!
Generally, the higher the diversity of a certain family of molecular species, the more advanced (or, sometimes, just younger) is the taxon. However, this is mostly true for secondary metabolism, I am not sure to which extent this applies to central metabolism and its branches. In algae, an increase of monoenoic/trienoic FA ratio often manifests stress and/or accumulation of storage lipids and is weakly related with the evolution of algal taxa.
I read few years ago that presence or accumulation of unusual monoenoic FAs is more typical for evolutionary primitive species, but I can not recall where it is was written. Oh, I've got memory like a sieve (
It was something belonging to the must read group of books, written by one of the classicist of lipid science.