Fish is More than a Brain Food
By Robert G. Ackman
ABSTRACT
A brief historical overview will be based on personal experience starting in 1950. Chemists had a role to play, for example Hilditch in Britain and Klenk in Germany, but the biochemists such as Ralph Holman of the Hormel Institute in the USA were leaders in the biochemistry of both n-6 and n-3 fatty acids. They were ably seconded by university colleagues world-wide and in the USDA Laboratories, because in that era basic research was good. Several interrelated factors interfered with an orderly and rational development of our understanding of truly essential fatty acids. The unexpected worldwide acceptance about 1950 of the demon cholesterol as the principal cause of cardiovascular death led to the associated finding that a substantial intake of polyunsaturated fatty acids reduced serum cholesterol. The edible oil people leaped into this market with oils high in the n-6 linoleic acid that was known to be "essential". Vegetable oils containing the n-3 alpha-linolenic acid were discouraged, to ensure stability in the ever-increasing market for deep frying oils. Shellfish were condemned owing to a misunderstanding of their sterol contents and fish consumption and good health were not associated with highly unsaturated fatty acids.
By good fortune Bang and Dyerberg were able to introduce the Greenland eskimo as proof that long-chain n-3 fatty acids had a vital role to play. These events of 1970-1980, followed by the Zutphen study of fish consumption and cardiovascular health published in 1985 first popularized the role of n-3 fatty acids in our body biochemistry.
KEYWORDS: highly unsaturated fatty acids, fish, shellfish, marine mammals
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