Compound Class

Lipids & Fatty Acids

Fats, fatty acids, and fat-soluble actives carried in seed and nut oils.

Overview

What Are Lipids & Fatty Acids?

Lipids and fatty acids are the plant kingdom's oils and fats — compounds defined not by a shared skeleton but by a shared behavior, dissolving readily in oils and organic solvents while resisting water.

The category gathers free fatty acids, the glycerides that make up most seed oils, waxes, and phospholipids such as lecithin, along with the fat-soluble actives that ride within these oily fractions.

Defining the Class

What qualifies a compound here is solubility rather than structure. If a molecule is hydrophobic — oil-loving and water-repelling — it is filed as a lipid, whether it is a simple fatty acid, a glyceride, a wax ester or a phospholipid.

This is a functional category drawn around physical behavior instead of a single defining ring or backbone, which makes it the least structurally coherent class on the site.

Where Lipids Occur

Lipids are the plant's most concentrated energy store, laid down chiefly in the tissues that must fuel a new generation:

Seeds and nuts, as pressed or cold-pressed oils

The germ of grains

Oily fruits such as olive, avocado and coconut

Cell membranes throughout the plant, as phospholipids

Because a plant's fat-soluble molecules travel dissolved in this oily matrix, the same tissues that hoard fat also carry its lipophilic actives.

Pharmacological Importance

The medicinal pattern is largely one of nourishment rather than pharmacology. The essential fatty acids of the omega-3 and omega-6 families cannot be made by the body and must come from the diet, where they serve as precursors to the signaling molecules that govern inflammation.

Beyond that, emollient oils soften and protect skin, and phospholipids such as phosphatidylcholine and phosphatidylserine supply structural material for cell membranes and nervous tissue.

Toxicity & Safety

Lipids are on the whole benign and nutritional, and most are foods before they are medicines.

The notable exception in this database is the annonaceous acetogenins of graviola and soursop, which are potent mitochondrial inhibitors and have been linked in research to neurotoxicity with sustained heavy intake. More prosaically, oils go rancid: oxidized fats are irritant and pro-inflammatory, so storage and freshness matter more here than in most classes.

Constituents

All Lipids & Fatty Acids

135 total Filter lipids & fatty acids

2-AG

Acetogenins Care 1 herb Alpha-linolenic acid 3 herbs Anacardol 1 herb Annocatacin A 1 herb Annocatacin B 1 herb Annomuricin A 1 herb Annomuricin B 1 herb Annomuricin C 1 herb Annomuricin D-ones 1 herb Annomuricine 1 herb Annomutacin 1 herb Annonaceous acetogenins Care 1 herb Annonacin Care 1 herb Annonacin A Care 1 herb Annonacin-10-one Care 1 herb Annonacin-A-one Care 1 herb Annopentocin A 1 herb Annopentocin B 1 herb Annopentocin C 1 herb Arachidamide (N-arachidonoyl amide) Arachidic acid 2 herbs Arachidonic acid 1 herb

Behenamide (N-behenyl amide)

Open in filterable index

Source Plants

Herbs Containing Lipids & Fatty Acids

38 herbs

Plants in the materia medica documented to carry lipids & fatty acids, with the compounds each one is listed for. The bar counts how many DISTINCT lipids & fatty acids are on record for a plant, relative to the best-documented — it measures breadth of record, not potency, so a plant with one well-studied compound can outrank a richer source that has simply been analysed less. Where a measured concentration is on record it is quoted inline; most entries have none yet.