Metabolism Model of Rapeseeds Offers Clues to Optimal Oil Production

U.S. scientists have developed a model for analyzing the metabolic processes of rapeseed plants, an innovation that they say may provide insights into more optimal production of biofuels and alternatives to petrochemicals for some industrial uses. Using the results of earlier studies and databases, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory compiled a model that includes 572 biochemical reactions that play roles in the metabolism of seeds and seed oil production. After comparing the model with experimental results, scientists were able to better predict some reactions and categorize reactions and pathways by the efficiency with which the seeds convert sugars into oil. “At this stage, we can enumerate, better than before, which genes and reactions are necessary for oil formation, and which make oil production most effective,” said Jorg Schwender, a Brookhaven biologist and lead author of two articles that will be published in Plant Journal. The researchers focused specifically on the metabolic pathways in the plant’s seeds because that is where oils are formed and accumulate during development.