triglycerides (was Carbs and physical activity)

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>>>>Butter is only about 2.6% butyric acid by weight, according to the USDA

database.

-------> and enig has it at about 4%. my description of butter as a

'concentrated' source of butyric acid is not accurate then, although i think

it does have the highest concentration of butyric acid as opposed to other

fats/oils (but that doesn't make it comparable to CO - my bad!). butyric

acid was first isolated from butter, and actually means 'butter' according

to pond in " the fats of life. " according to enig, butter has 28% oleic acid,

26% palmitic, 12% myristic, 1% caprylic, and a few others (i'm too lazy to

type them all out).

>>>Speaking of which, I've always wondered--what's the difference in

calorie density between fats composed of different fatty acids? I'd expect,

for example, an EPA triglyceride to have more calories per gram than a

butyric acid triglyceride, but how much?

---->i'm not sure if there's any such thing as an " EPA triglyceride " or

especially a butyric acid triglyceride. AFAIK, triglycerides are typically

(or always?) composed of fatty acids of different chain lengths, at least

this is typical of the triglycerides that compose cell membranes, i believe.

i also don't think butyric acid gets stored in triglycerides because it's

too short and probably gets used for energy before it can be stored...but am

not certain, maybe someone else knows. But every drawing and every

description I've read has the 3 fatty acids at different chain lengths,

which i think is the *typical* configuration in mammals. here's something

about this from pond:

" In principle, triacylglycerols could include any kind of fatty acids, but

in practice, we find that almost all the fatty acids in the major storage

lipids in most animals and plants, including almost all the species that we

use as food, are long-chain.

<snip>

The triplets of fatty acids esterfied to glycerol [a triglyceride] are not

necessarily of the same type: the middle one is nearly always different from

the other two, and often the molecule contans three different kinds of fatty

acid. " (p.13)

>>>>There's a fat substitute called

Benefat which works somewhat along these lines, replacing one or two

longer-chain tryglycerides with acetic, propionic, or butyric acid, but I

couldn't find figures for pure butyric acid. I assume that the reason that

they don't

http://ingredients.danisco.com/products/detail.jsp?pid=2_1_9

---->oh god! what next??? 'benefat' sounds like that new dog food, what's it

called..benefood, or bene_something_or_other? according to this web page a

traditional fat with 3 long chain FAs supposedly has more calories than one

which they engineered to have one long chain and 2 short chain FAs. but enig

writes that another fake fat, " Caprenin " made from crylic acid, capric acid,

and beneic acid has also been touted as low cal because the long chain

behenic acid is only partially digested and absored by some people. this

makes me wonder if there aren't other long chain FAs that are only partially

digested, and if it's not erroneous to equate chain length with how many

calories it delivers? (apparently caprenin is engineered to have one long

chain and two short chain FAs, just like benefat). if our fat stores were

designed by nature to hold primarily or exclusively long chain FAs, i wonder

what the long term consequences are of replacing them with these fake fats

and their short chain FAs...?

>>>>>I checked the USDA database and it seems to confirm this. Salmon oil,

with

all its very long chain fatty acids, has 9.02 calories per gram, while

coconut oil has only 8.62.

-------->just curious, was the salmon oil from *farmed* atlantic salmon, or

wild pacific? I'd imagine the wild would have a higher EPA/DHA content...

Suze Fisher

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