Animal foods supply nutritious sources of essential nutrients for the human diet. Meat, milk, cheese, eggs, fish, etcetera, provide concentrated energy including essential fatty acids, high quality protein rich in essential amino acids as well as numerous vitamins and minerals with high bioavailability. This collection of papers was assembled specifically to review the literature related to fat nutrition and metabolism across a range of food animal species. The papers span from applied nutrition principles and practical feeding values to fundamental aspects of lipid metabolism, including bioactive n-6 and n-3 fatty acids and oxidized fats. Articles review the challenges and impacts of modifying fatty acid composition of animal-derived foods via dietary supplementation, with potential health benefits of doing so. Journal of Animal Science and Biotechnology is a leading open access journal publishing innovative research across agriculture, dairy and animal science.