A FAAH substrate discovered during metabolite profiling
Several different arachidonoyl amino acid conjugates, including N-arachidonoyl dopamine and N-arachidonoyl-L-serine, have been isolated and characterized from bovine brain. N-Nervonyl taurine is one of several novel taurine-conjugated fatty acids discovered during mass spectrometry lipidomic analysis of brain and spinal cord from wild-type and fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) knockout mice. The levels of N-nervonyl taurine were elevated ~25 fold in FAAH-/- mice compared to wild-type mice, indicating that FAAH utilizes N-nervonyl taurine as a substrate. However, in vitro experiments with purified FAAH indicate that related N-fatty acyl taurines and ethanolamines of similar chain length are hydrolyzed 2,000-50,000 times more slowly by FAAH compared to oleoyl ethanolamide. The biological function of the taurine fatty acids class of molecules, as well as their relevance to endocannabinoid signaling, remains to be determined. N-acyl taurines bearing polyunsaturated acyl chains can activate members of the transient receptor potential (TRP) family of calcium channels, including TRPV1 and TRPV4.
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