Bile salt-stimulated lipase and pancreatic lipase-related protein 2 are the dominating lipases in neonatal fat digestion in mice and rats.

During infancy, the basic conditions for digestion of dietary fat differ from later in life. The bile salt-stimulated lipase (BSSL) is an enzyme expressed in the exocrine pancreas and in some species (including human) also in the lactating mammary gland and secreted with the milk. The aim of this study was to compare the ontogeny of four pancreatic lipases [BSSL, pancreatic triglyceride lipase (PL), pancreatic lipase-related protein 2 (PLRP2), and phospholipase A2 (PLA2)] in one species that supplies BSSL with milk (the mouse) and one that does not (the rat). We followed expression of the four pancreatic lipases from postnatal d 1 until after weaning in both species. We found that BSSL and PLRP2, two lipases with broad substrate specificity, dominated. It was not until weaning that significant expression of PL and PLA2 were induced. Thus, BSSL and PLRP2 seem to be responsible for fat digestion as long as milk is the main food. Moreover, the early temporal pattern of BSSL expression differed between species. We speculate that the milk-borne BSSL is able to compensate for a slower ontogeny of pancreatic BSSL expression in the mouse.