Enrichment of C17:0-rich saturated fatty acids from sheep tail fat for adjuvant therapy of non-small-cell lung cancer.

ABSTRACT

Heptadecanoic acid (C170), an odd-chain saturated fatty acid (OCSFA) in ruminant lipid, has been demonstrated to be potential for treating cancers. Our results also showed that sheep tail fat (STF) with higher level of C170-containing saturated fatty acids (SFAs) whereas lower level of oleic acid (C181), performed remarkable inhibition against non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cells. To enrich the content of C170, a C170-rich SFA concentrate (HRSC) was prepared from STF by solvent crystallization and urea complexation methods (hexane/STF = 3.5/1, 4 °C for 8 h, and 80% ethanol/urea/free fatty acids = 8/1/1, 4 °C for 6 h). The content of C170 was up from 3.02 to 6.34% and the recovery was 4.17%. Biological experiments showed that HRSC exerted better antiproliferative effect against NSCLC cells. Moreover, HRSC performed enhanced inhibitory effect in A549 cell xenograft mouse model. Therefore, HRSC has the potential to be applied in adjuvant therapy for NSCLC. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10068-023-01504-w.