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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1982 Oct;79(19):5808–5812. doi: 10.1073/pnas.79.19.5808

Isolation and function of spinach leaf β-ketoacyl-[acyl-carrier-protein] synthases

Takashi Shimakata 1, Paul K Stumpf 1
PMCID: PMC346999  PMID: 16593232

Abstract

Crude spinach leaf extract readily forms the stearoyl derivative of acyl-carrier-protein (ACP) when acetyl-ACP and malonyl-ACP are incubated together. Palmitoyl-ACP is also elongated by malonyl-ACP to stearoyl-ACP. When β-ketoacyl-ACP synthase {3-oxoacyl-[ACP] synthase; acyl-[ACP]:malonyl-[ACP] C-acyltransferase (decarboxylating), EC 2.3.1.41} is purified with decanoyl-ACP as the assay substrate, palmitoyl-ACP elongation activity is lost. When palmitoyl-ACP is the assay substrate, another protein is isolated that specifically elongates palmitoyl-ACP to β-ketostearoyl-ACP but has no activity towards decanoyl-ACP. The first protein is designated β-ketoacyl-ACP synthase I and participates in the conversion of acetyl-ACP to palmitoyl-ACP, whereas the second protein is designated β-ketoacyl-ACP synthase II, and its substrate specificity is highly restricted to myristoyl-ACP and palmitoyl-ACP. The purification of synthase II is described, and its activity is compared to synthase I. Reconstitution experiments with the highly purified nonassociated enzymes in fatty acid synthesis plus synthases I and II clearly demonstrate the roles of these two proteins in fatty acid synthesis.

Keywords: plant fatty acid biosynthesis, cerulenin inhibition

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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