Table 2.
Estimates of fatty acid concentrations (μg/ml) in Caucasian and East Asian males and females
| Fatty acid | Caucasians | East Asians | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Males | Females | p-value | Males | Females | p-value | |||||||
| μg/ml | SD | μg/ml | SD | t-test | MLR | μg/ml | SD | μg/ml | SD | t-test | MLR | |
| 18:2n6 | 594.5 | 151.9 | 641.6 | 141.0 | <0.01* | <0.01* | 626.6 | 159.6 | 669.2 | 139.1 | 0.01* | 0.03* |
| 18:3n3 | 14.1 | 9.2 | 15.2 | 7.0 | 0.18 | 0.20 | 14.4 | 6.8 | 15.7 | 6.5 | 0.10 | 0.03* |
| 20:4n6 | 118.7 | 35.6 | 127.3 | 37.3 | 0.04* | 0.09 | 112.7 | 31.5 | 114.1 | 30.8 | 0.71 | 0.88 |
| 20:5n3 | 11.5 | 7.5 | 11.7 | 8.2 | 0.82 | <0.01* | 12.9 | 7.7 | 12.8 | 9.9 | 0.95 | 0.80 |
| 22:6n3 | 23.7 | 9.0 | 31.3 | 12.5 | <0.01* | <0.01* | 32.3 | 11.2 | 35.2 | 12.1 | 0.03* | 0.04* |
| [AA/LA] | 0.204 | 0.005 | 0.201 | 0.003 | 0.60 | 0.24 | 0.197 | 0.012 | 0.176 | 0.004 | 0.09 | 0.19 |
| [DHA/ALA] | 2.0 | 1.1 | 2.3 | 1.1 | 0.02* | 0.03* | 2.5 | 1.2 | 2.5 | 1.1 | 0.85 | 0.47 |
| [EPA/ALA] | 0.923 | 0.062 | 0.851 | 0.038 | 0.32 | 0.30 | 1.003 | 0.070 | 0.906 | 0.048 | 0.29 | 0.14 |
| [DHA/EPA] | 2.5 | 1.1 | 3.3 | 1.5 | <0.01* | <0.01* | 3.0 | 1.0 | 3.7 | 1.7 | <0.01* | <0.01* |
Select fatty acids used as substrate and product of D5D and D6D desaturase indices. The * denotes p-values which are significant (<0.05). P-values were determined using Student’s t-test and multiple linear regression (MLR) models which were adjusted for BMI, age, dietary LA, ALA, EPA and DHA, % total energy from dietary fat and physical activity. Caucasian males: n = 113; Caucasian females: n = 298; East Asian Males: n = 98; East Asian Females: n = 277. Abbreviation: SD standard deviation.