Also see:
“Curing” a High Metabolic Rate with Unsaturated Fats
Cardiolipin, Cytochrome Oxidase, Metabolism, & Aging
Errors in Nutrition: Essential Fatty Acids
Thumbs Up: Fructose
PUFA Accumulation & Aging
Toxicity of Stored PUFA
Dietary PUFA Reflected in Human Subcutaneous Fat Tissue
Israeli Paradox: High Omega -6 Diet Promotes Disease
PUFA Accumulation & Aging
Unsaturated Fats and Longevity
Arachidonic Acid’s Role in Stress and Shock
Protective “Essential Fatty Acid Deficiency”
Anti-Inflammatory Omega -9 Mead Acid (Eicosatrienoic acid)
Copper: The Forgotten Essential Nutrient
Quotes by Ray Peat, PhD:
“A crucial enzyme in the mitochondrion is cytochrome oxidase, which reacts directly with oxygen, completing (or beginning) the process of chemical respiration. It is this enzyme (which is most sensitive to cyanide) which appears to be a “choke point” for energy production in various situations. Learning how to preserve and promote the activity of this enzyme is an important issue for everything having to do with biological energy…Kunkel and Willians (J. Biol. Chem., 1951) found that the very high respiratory rate of animals fed a diet lacking polyunsaturated fats was caused primarily by a great increase in the activity of cytochrome oxidase, and that adding an “essential fatty acid” strongly inhibited this enzyme’s activity.”
“Burr didn’t understand that it was his rats’ high sugar diet, freed of the anti-oxidative unsaturated fatty acids, that caused their extremely high metabolic rate, but since that time many experiments have made it clear that it is specifically the fructose component of sucrose that is protective against the antimetabolic fats.
Although Brown, et al., weren’t focusing on the biological effects of sugar, their results are important in the history of sugar research because their work was done before the culture had been influenced by the development of the lipid theory of heart disease, and the later idea that fructose is responsible for increasing the blood lipids.”
“As early as 1951, it was known (Kunkel and Williams, J. BioI. Chern.) that the polyunsaturated fatty acids strongly inhibit the crucial respiratory enzyme, cytochrome oxidase, and that inhibition of this enzyme has a very important effect on the whole animal suppressing its metabolic rate, reducing the number of calories it can burn. It is now known that polyunsaturated fats interfere with thyroid hormone in just about every conceivable way.”
“Cytochrome oxidase is one of the enzymes damaged by stress and by blue light, and activated or restored by red light, thyroid, and progesterone.”
“A crucial enzyme in the mitochondrion is cytochrome oxidase, which reacts directly with oxygen, completing (or beginning) the process of chemical respiration. It is this enzyme (which is most sensitive to cyanide) which appears to be a “choke point” for energy production in various situations. Learning how to preserve and promote the activity of this enzyme is an important issue for everything having to do with biological energy.”
“The suppressive effects of unsaturated fats on mitochondrial energy production have been widely investigated, since it is that effect that makes animal fattening with PUFA so economical. Rather than interpreting that as a toxic effect, using the innate structure and function of the mitochondrion as a point of reference from which to evaluate dietary components, the consumption of “good” oils is being used as the reference point from which to evaluate the meaning of metabolism (“efficiency is good,” “low oxygen consumption is good”). Building on the idea that the oils are health-promoters which increase metabolic efficiency, the never-viable “rate of aging” theory was resuscitated: The anti-respiratory effect of PUFA is used (illogically) to return to the idea that aging occurs in proportion to the amount of oxygen consumed, because animals which lack the supposedly essential nutrients (“defective animals”) consume oxygen rapidly–burning calories rapidly, they are supposed to be like a candle that won’t last as long if it burns intensely. The old theory is simply resuscitated to explain why the anti-respiratory action of PUFA might be beneficial, justifying further promotion of their use as food and drugs.”
“The mitochondria are responsible for the efficient production of energy needed for the functioning of complex organisms, and especially for nerves. The enzymes in the mitochondria that reacts directly with oxygen, and that is often rate limiting, is cytochrome c oxidase.
The enzyme is dependent on the thyroid hormone is inhibited by nitric oxide, carbon monoxide, estrogen, polyunsaturated fatty acids, serotonin, excess or free iron, ionizing radiation, and many toxins, including bacterial endotoxin. Red light, which passes easily through the tissues, reactivates the enzyme, which slowly loses its function during darkness.”
“When mitochondria are functioning fully, either glucose or saturated fats can safely
provide energy. Some glucose or saturated fat can be converted to polyunsaturated fats, that can be used as regulators or signals, for example to activate the formation of stem cells. But those PUFA don’t create disruptive cascades of increasing excitation or inflammation or excessive growth, and, from the evidence of animals that are fed fat free diets, or diets lacking omega -3 and omega -6 fatty acids, they aren’t toxic to mitochondria.”
“Increased estrogen exposure, decreased thyroid hormone, an increased ratio of iron to copper, and lack of light, are other factors that impair the cytochrome oxidase enzyme.”
J Biol Chem. 1951 Apr;189(2):755-61.
The effects of fat deficiency upon enzyme activity in the rat.
KUNKEL HO, WILLIAMS JN Jr.
The activity of the cytochrome oxidase, however, is markedly increased in fat deficiency…In each case the activity of livers from rats fed the basal diet was 38 per cent greater than from the linoleate-supplemented animals or from the animals receiving corn oil. This is particularly interesting in view of the observation of Burr and Beeber (8) and Wesson and Burr (9) that fat-deficient rats had a markedly increased metabolic rate. The latter authors reported that the basal and assimilatory metabolic rates of fat-deficient animals were 25 per cent greater than the rates of the control animals. Thus the liver cytochrome oxidase activity appears to parallel the metabolic rate in fat deficiency. This increased cytochrome oxidase activity in liver and perhaps other tissues may account in a large part for the increased metabolic rate.
Summary
A fat deficiency in the rat causes a marked increase in liver cytochrome oxidase activity, a slight increase in choline oxidase activity, and a marked decrease in endogenous respiration. The activity of the succinic oxidase system is not altered by this deficiency condition. Supplementation with 100 mg. of methyl linoleate per rat per day reduced the cytochrome oxidase to the level of that produced by a 5 percent corn oil diet.
