title: Polyunsaturated fatty acid levels in rat tissues after chronic treatment with dietetic oils.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The essential fatty acids can be helpful in the prevention of several pathologies. The purpose of this study was to quantify the major n-3 and n-6 fatty acids in tissues of rats fed with flaxseed oil and with a dietetic oil in order to evaluate how their chronic supplementation could influence the correspondent in vivo levels and to study the effectiveness of the dietetic oil compared to flaxseed oil.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Fatty acids were successfully extracted from biological samples, subjected to derivatization procedure and analysed by high-performance liquid chromatography with UV detection under gradient elution mode. The developed method showed good linearity, precision and accuracy, with recoveries ranging from 89% to 92%. Animals treated with flaxseed and dietetic oils showed enhanced levels of n-3 fatty acids compared to control groups, with significantly higher levels of eicosapentaenoic acid and docosahexaenoic acid in the brain and in the adipose tissue of the dietetic group compared to the flaxseed group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The obtained data underline that the tested oils can effectively enhance the tissue levels of n-3 fatty acids and therefore they could be successfully used in the dietetic treatment of lipid-related diseases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, 41125 Modena, Italy. cecilia.rustichelli@unimore.it
authors.forename: Cecilia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rustichelli
authors.forename: Rossella
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Avallone
authors.forename: Enrico
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Campioli
authors.forename: Daniela
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Braghiroli
authors.forename: Mario
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Baraldi
mesh_terms: D000273:Adipose Tissue / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism; D000818:Animals; D001921:Brain / Q000378:metabolism; D004042:Dietary Fats, Unsaturated / Q000032:analysis* / Q000378:metabolism*; D005231:Fatty Acids, Unsaturated / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism*; D008043:Linseed Oil / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism; D008297:Male; D011897:Random Allocation; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley
chemical_list: D004042:Dietary Fats, Unsaturated; D005231:Fatty Acids, Unsaturated; D008043:Linseed Oil