Showing posts with label lipids. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lipids. Show all posts

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Lipids - Copepods



NEWS

Copepods eat their own weight belts

14 December 2011, by Tom Marshall

Scientists have solved the mystery of how tiny marine crustaceans called copepods regulate the rhythms of their life-cycle.












....

"It turns out that it's all about oil. The copepods have specialised fat stores that act like weight belts, letting the copepods maintain their depth easily and avoid attracting predators' attention with unnecessary movements. Building up enough fat reserves seems to be an essential step before diapause can begin - these reserves automatically trigger diapause once they reach a threshold level."

...

"Pond explains that the unsaturated fats that are crucial for buoyancy control are found mostly in plankton algae known as diatoms, so having these to feed on is crucial for copepods' ability to diapause successfully. He now plans to look at whether similar mechanisms help control the movements of other animal plankton, such as krill."


Saturday, November 21, 2009

Biodiesel from Diatoms - Lipid content

http://www.jbc.org/content/141/1/283.full.pdf

SUMMARY

1. The lipids of freshly collected marine diatoms contain a very high per cent of free fatty acid, apparently irrespective of species.

2. When a suspension of diatoms is allowed to stand for 6 months, the content of free acids falls markedly, and the content of hydrocarbon may rise.