Welcome to the new version of CaltechAUTHORS. Login is currently restricted to library staff. If you notice any issues, please email coda@library.caltech.edu
Published August 24, 2010 | Published
Journal Article Open

Colorimetric Measurement of Triglycerides Cannot Provide an Accurate Measure of Stored Fat Content in Drosophila

Abstract

Drosophila melanogaster has recently emerged as a useful model system in which to study the genetic basis of regulation of fat storage. One of the most frequently used methods for evaluating the levels of stored fat (triglycerides) in flies is a coupled colorimetric assay available as a kit from several manufacturers. This is an aqueous-based enzymatic assay that is normally used for measurement of mammalian serum triglycerides, which are present in soluble lipoprotein complexes. In this short communication, we show that coupled colorimetric assay kits cannot accurately measure stored triglycerides in Drosophila. First, they fail to give accurate readings when tested on insoluble triglyceride mixtures with compositions like that of stored fat, or on fat extracted from flies with organic solvents. This is probably due to an inability of the lipase used in the kits to efficiently cleave off the glycerol head group from fat molecules in insoluble samples. Second, the measured final products of the kits are quinoneimines, which absorb visible light in the same wavelength range as Drosophila eye pigments. Thus, when extracts from crushed flies are assayed, much of the measured signal is actually due to eye pigments. Finally, the lipoprotein lipases used in colorimetric assays also cleave non-fat glycerides. The glycerol backbones liberated from all classes of glycerides are measured through the remaining reactions in the assay. As a consequence, when these assay kits are used to evaluate tissue extracts, the observed signal actually represents the amount of free glycerols together with all types of glycerides. For these reasons, findings obtained through use of coupled colorimetric assays on Drosophila samples must be interpreted with caution. We also show here that using thin-layer chromatography to measure stored triglycerides in flies eliminates all of these problems.

Additional Information

© 2010 Al-Anzi, Zinn. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Received May 21, 2010; Accepted July 18, 2010; Published August 24, 2010. Editor: Andreas Bergmann, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, United States of America. Funding: NIH RO1 grants DK0170154, NS28182. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Author Contributions: Conceived and designed the experiments: BFAA. Performed the experiments: BFAA. Analyzed the data: BFAA KZ. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: BFAA. Wrote the paper: KZ.

Attached Files

Published - AlAnzi2010p11309PLoS_ONE.pdf

Files

AlAnzi2010p11309PLoS_ONE.pdf
Files (446.7 kB)
Name Size Download all
md5:b408c54a83f893c17e7874a43e4a6248
446.7 kB Preview Download

Additional details

Created:
August 19, 2023
Modified:
October 20, 2023