N-Acyl Amino Acids: Metabolism, Molecular Targets, and Role in Biological Processes

Abstract

The lipid signal is becoming increasingly crowded as increasingly fatty acid amide derivatives are being identified and considered relevant therapeutic targets. The identification of N-arachidonoyl-ethanolamine as endogenous ligand of cannabinoid type-1 and type-2 receptors as well as the development of different -omics technologies have the merit to have led to the discovery of a huge number of naturally occurring N-acyl-amines. Among those mediators, N-acyl amino acids, chemically related to the endocannabinoids and belonging to the complex lipid signaling system now known as endocannabinoidome, have been rapidly growing for their therapeutic potential. Here, we review the current knowledge of the mechanisms for the biosynthesis and inactivation of the N-acyl amino acids, as well as the various molecular targets for some of the N-acyl amino acids described so far.

Keywords: N-acyl Glycines; N-acyl Serines; N-acyl amino acids.

Figure 1

Schematic network of NAAAs metabolic routes, which shows interaction between biosynthetic (solid lines) and degradative (dot lines) pathways. Enzymes are black circles; white color represents all the amino acids while colored circles are the amino acids detailed in the test.