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Lipids are a class of relatively water-insoluble organic molecules, which are the "basic" components of biological membranes. There are three forms of lipids: phospholipids , steroids , and triglycerides .
In an aqueous system, the polar heads of lipids align towards the polar, aqueous environment, while the hydrophobic tails minimize their contact with water and tend to cluster together, forming a vesicle; depending on the concentration of the lipid, this biophysical interaction may result in the formation of micelles, liposomes, or lipid bilayers.
Membrane lipids are a group of compounds (structurally similar to fats and oils) which form the lipid bilayer of the cell membrane. The three major classes of membrane lipids are phospholipids, glycolipids, and cholesterol. Lipids are amphiphilic: they have one end that is soluble in water ('polar') and an ending that is soluble in fat ...
In eukaryotes, cell membranes also contain another class of lipid, sterol, interspersed among the phospholipids. The combination provides fluidity in two dimensions combined with mechanical strength against rupture. Purified phospholipids are produced commercially and have found applications in nanotechnology and materials science. [3]
Palmitoleic acid has 16 carbons, is found in cod liver oil, sardine oil, and herring oil, and is a cis-9-monounsaturated fatty acid. C 15 H 29 CO 2 H, IUPAC organization name (Z)-hexadec-9-enoic acid, n-7, numerical representation of 16:1, molecular weight 254.41, melting point 5 °C, specific gravity 0.894. CAS Registry Number 373-49-9.
While the research is currently ongoing, researchers are learning that different subspecies contain different apolipoproteins, proteins, and lipid contents between species which have different physiological roles. [14] For example, within the HDL lipoprotein subspecies, a large number of proteins are involved in general lipid metabolism. [14]
Examples of various lipid species. Lipidomics is the large-scale study of pathways and networks of cellular lipids in biological systems. [1] [2] [3] The word "lipidome" is used to describe the complete lipid profile within a cell, tissue, organism, or ecosystem and is a subset of the "metabolome" which also includes other major classes of biological molecules (such as amino acids, sugars ...
The structure of this lipid differs in plants and animals, regarding fatty acid composition. In addition, phosphatidylserine plays an important role in the human brain content, as it makes up 13–15% of the phospholipids in the human cerebral cortex. This lipid is found in a wide range of places.