Member SpotlightsGenetics and Biochemistry of Seed Lipids at CSIC Enrique Martinez Force, Ph.D. A Science Advisory Board Member Since 1997  Enrique Martinez Force, Ph.D., is Head of the Department of Physiology & Technology of Plant Products at Institute de la Grasa, CSIC (Spanish National Research Council), Spain. Martinez Force received his Ph.D. from the University of Seville (1992) and his thesis work focused on, “…the biosynthesis of amino acids derived from aspartic acid and the development of threonine and methionine overproducer Saccharomyces cerevisiae mutants.” He completed his post-doctoral work in the US; first at the Department of Biochemistry at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and later at the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Biology at Case Western Reserve University. During his post-doc, he worked on the, “…characterization of SRP54 protein in Schizosaccharomyces pombe based on site-directed mutagenesis” before joining the Group of Genetics and Biochemistry of Seed Lipids at Instituto de la Grasa, CSIC in 1995. Martinez Force has been a tenured scientist at CSIC since 2000 and his societal memberships include the European Federation for the Science and Technology of Lipids, the Spanish Society of Biotechnology, and the Spanish Association of Sunflower Breeders. Research Interests In the Group of Genetics and Biochemistry of Seed Lipids we have two main targets. After several years of research on the effect of the partially hydrogenated vegetal oils on the health, it has been confirmed that they are products that must be reduced or eliminated from our diet. Countries like Denmark and Australia have imposed a maximum content of 2% of these fatty acids in the oil present in foods. In addition, since January 2006 in the US, the FDA will require that all foods be labeled with the trans fatty acid content. Since August 2006, the Mercosur will also [require this]. In the past, animal fats were avoided because of their unhealthy effects due to the palmitic and myristic contents. Actually there is a proposal to use tropical fats, that contain palmitic and myristic acids, to avoid the hydrogenated fats. Therefore, we will come back to unhealthy fats, like the animal fats used, before the hydrogenated fats. With the purpose of replacing these unhealthful fats and oils we have obtained and characterized a collection of sunflower mutants with modifications in the fatty acid composition of their oils. These new oils are used in the manufacture of really healthful margarines. Sunflower collections that we keep are increasing with new mutants. These new sunflower oils have increased stearic content. According with the WHO, stearic is the only saturated fatty acid that does not modify plasma cholesterol levels. In a near future, it will be a paradoxically healthy fat, available for margarine, spreads, pastry, confectionary, frozen fried potatoes, and related products. The first commercial hybrids will be available on 2009 under the “Nutrisun” denomination, commercialized by ADVANTA Seeds Company. At the same time that we have been developing these new lines, we have characterized the genetics, biochemistry and molecular biology of the biosynthetic pathway of fatty acids and triacylglycerols in sunflower developing seeds. Our second target is to develop industrial crops to be used as biofactories to avoid the use of food crops as energy sources. Right now we are working on modified castor seeds to be use as an oil base in biolubricants in a funded project called Biovesin. Career Motivations and Expectations While there are a lot of restrictions in the use of chemical products in nature, we don’t have them when we move to the food industry; in particular, talking about fats. One way would be to label the products with enough information and the final decision would be from the consumer. But we decide to obtain a healthy vegetable oil, avoiding labeling and giving security to consumers. Our main goal is to provide healthy fats to everybody and to separate clearly food crops from industrial crops, avoiding the rise of prices that we currently are seeing in corn, sugar beet, barley, sunflower oil, etc. The Utilization of Proteomics in Seed Lipid Research Most of the proteins involved in fatty acid modification and lipid biosynthesis in seeds are located in the endoplasmic reticulum and used to be membrane-bound proteins. For some of these, gene activities are unknown. So we obtain microsomal fractions from developing seeds enriched in different activities at different levels, compare 2D gels, pick putative peptides for those activities, obtain fragment sequences by comparison with the Arabidopsis proteome and try to clone them from sunflowers. I am not an expert in clinical proteomics but one of its purposes is the identification of low abundant proteins, pathological markers. Traditional approaches, as identification of individual proteins by 2D gel electrophoresis and LC-MS/MS, as well as the serum protein profiling approach, are been applied successfully to the search for disease biomarkers. Another approach is the removal of the most abundant proteins, but there is a risk that a number of the potential proteins of interest will be lost, bound to the most abundant molecules. The 2-DE fluorescent (2-DE DIGE) technology made it possible to identify and quantify very small alterations of protein expression, using fluorescent detection of proteins in the 2D gels. So, I think the current generation of proteomics tools is sufficient but resolution improvement is needed. The research at the Instituto de la Grasa (IG) is mostly devoted to analytical characterization of fats and oils; only in the Department of Physiology and Technology of Plant Products are some research groups using molecular biology and proteomics in their work. The proteomics research at IG is directed to address oil quality and health problems; in particular in sunflowers (proteins involved on new fatty acids distribution on triacylglycerols) and olive trees (proteins involved on olive oil flavor). If you'd like to comment on this article or join in discussion on other topics with SAB members, please visit our community forums. Website Resources: Group of Genetics and Biochemistry of Seed Lipids CSIC, Spanish National Research Council Biovesin Nutrisun Publications Martinez Force, E., Alvarez-Ortega, R. and Garces, R. (1999) Enzymatic characterization of high palmitic sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) mutants. Planta 207, 533-538. Cantisan, S., Martinez-Force, E. and Garces, R. (2000) Enzymatic studies of high stearic acid sunflower seed mutants. Plant Physiol. Biochem. 38: 377-382. Martinez Force, E., Cantisan, S., Serrano-Vega, M. J. and Garces, R. (2000) Acyl-acyl carrier protein thioesterase activity from sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) seeds. Planta 211: 673-678. Martinez-Force, E. and Garces, R. (2002) Dynamic channelling during de novo fatty acid biosynthesis in Helianthus annuus seeds. Plant Physiol. Biochem. 40: 383-391. Serrano-Vega, MJ., Venegas-Caleron, M., Garces, R. and Martinez-Force, E. (2003) Cloning and expression of fatty acids biosynthesis key enzymes from sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) in Escherichia coli. J. Chromatography B 786: 221-228. Martinez-Force, E., Ruiz-Lopez, N. and Garces, R. (2004) The determination of the asymmetrical stereochemical distribution of fatty acids in triacylglycerols. Anal. Biochem. 334: 175-182. Pleite, R., Pike, M.J., Garces, R., Martínez-Force, E. and Rawsthorne, S. (2005) The sources of carbon and reducing power for fatty acid synthesis in the heterotrophic plastids of developing sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) embryos. J. Exp. Bot. 56: 1297-1303. Serrano-Vega, M.J., Garces, R. and Martinez-Force, E. (2005) Cloning, characterization and structural model of a FatA-type thioesterase from sunflower seeds (Helianthus annuus L.). Planta 221: 868-880. Fernandez-Moya, V., Martinez-Force, E. and Garces, R. (2005) Oils from improved high stearic acid sunflower seeds. J. Agric. Food Chem. 53: 5326-5330. Venegas-Caleron, M., Muro-Pastor, A.M., Garces, R. and Martinez-Force, E. (2006) Functional characterization of a plastidial omega-3 desaturase from sunflower (Helianthus annuus) in cyanobacteria. Plant Physiol. Biochem. 44: 517-525. Pleite, R., Martinez-Force, E. and Garces, R. (2006) Increase of the stearic acid content in high-oleic sunflower (Helianthus annuus) seeds. J. Agric. Food Chem. 54: 9383-9388. Salas, J.J., Youssar, L., Martinez-Force, E. and Garces, R. (2008) The biochemical characterization of a high-stearic acid sunflower mutant reveals the coordinated regulation of stearoyl-acyl carrier protein desaturases. Plant Physiol. Bioche. 46: 109-116. ### << Previous Next >> [ View All Member Spotlights ] |
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