Lichtgedanken 02

Editorial 35 02 | LICHT GEDANKEN Contact Prof. Dr Stefan Schuster Chair of Bioinformatics Ernst-Abbe-Platz 2, D-07743 Jena, Germany Phone: ++ 49 3641 949580 Email: stefan.schu@uni-jena.de pinguin.biologie.uni-jena.de/bioinformatik Original Publication Schuster S et al. Use of Fibonacci numbers in lipidomics – enumerating various classes of fatty acids. Scientific Reports 7 (2017) 39821, DOI: 10.1038/srep39821 only one structure is possible in each case for chain lengths of one or two carbon atoms, the number grows to two, three, five, etc. for three and more carbon atoms. »With six carbon atoms, we already have eight possible struc- tures, with seven, thirteen and so on.« The Golden Section in nature The factor 1.618... describes a ratio known in nature but also in art as the »Golden Section«. It is to be found in architectural masterpieces such as the old town hall in Leipzig but also in flowers, snail shells and even in the human body. If the ratio of parts of a building or the proportions of plants or bodies correspond to a figure of roughly 1.618, the human eye perceives them as being especially well-balanced and »harmonious«. »Even the leaves of many plants or the seeds of the sunflower are arranged in accordance with this rule,« Prof. Dr Severin Sasso from the Institute of General Botany and Plant Physiolo- gy explains. The Junior Professor for Molecular Botany is one of the authors of the publication along with doctoral student Maximilian Fichtner. »It is in- teresting that even certain constituent parts of the sunflower – the fatty acids – follow this principle,« Dr Sasso says. However, not all possible fatty acids occur in sunflower oil by a long way. It consists largely of fatty acids with a chain length of 16 or 18 carbon atoms. According to the calculations made by the Jena bioinformatics researchers, there could be almost 1,000 and over 2,500 different versions of them re- spectively. »Similar correlations apply to certain classes of amino acids,« Ma- ximilian Fichtner adds. The results relating to the Fibonacci sequence in fatty acids can be applied primarily in the area of lipidomics – the comprehensive analysis of all fats in a cell or organism. »An exact knowledge of what substances can theoretically occur is essential for this work,« Prof. Schuster emphasizes. The metabolic processes and interactions with other cellular substances involving fats and their constituent parts are examined with the aid of lipidomics. The arrangement of the seeds of marguerites, daisies or sunflowers, but also the structure of romanesco broccoli (photo left), follows the Fibonacci sequence: the ratio of two successive numbers approaches ever closer to the ratio of the »Golden Section«. The resulting »golden angle« of 137.5 degrees forms the optimum angle between successive leaves or florets.