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Review
. 2020 Oct 26;9(11):1546.
doi: 10.3390/foods9111546.

Occurrence of n-Alkanes in Vegetable Oils and Their Analytical Determination

Ana Srbinovska  1 , Chiara Conchione  1 , Luca Menegoz Ursol  1 , Paolo Lucci  1 , Sabrina Moret  1
Affiliations
Review

Occurrence of n-Alkanes in Vegetable Oils and Their Analytical Determination

Ana Srbinovska et al. Foods. .

Abstract

Vegetable oils contain endogenous linear hydrocarbons, namely n-alkanes, ranging from n-C21 to n-C35, with odd chain lengths prevalent. Different vegetable oils, as well as oils of the same type, but of different variety and provenience, show typical n-alkane patterns, which could be used as a fingerprint to characterize them. In the first part of this review, data on the occurrence of n-alkanes in different vegetable oils (total and predominant n-alkanes) are given, with a focus on obtaining information regarding variety and geographical origin. The second part aims to provide the state of the art on available analytical methods for their determination. In particular, a detailed description of the sample preparation protocols and analytical determination is reported, pointing out the main drawbacks of traditional sample preparation and possible solutions to implement the analysis with the aim to shift toward rapid and solvent-sparing methods.

Keywords: chromatography; geographical origin; n-alkanes; olive oils; sample preparation; statistical analysis; variety differentiation; vegetable oils.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(a) Bianchera and (b) Leccino—Typical HPLC-GC-FID traces of extra virgin olive oils without MOSH presence; (c)—olive oil trace with mineral oil hydrocarbons (MOSH) presence.
Figure 2
Figure 2
GC-MS chromatograms of different vegetable oils: (A) grapeseed oil, (B) hazelnut oil, (C) olive oil (Arbequina), (D) peanut oil, (E) corn oil and (F) sunflower. Reference [3] with permission from Elsevier.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Discriminant analysis—scatterplot of canonical scores (range, coefficient 0.95). Reference [11] with permission from Elsevier.
Figure 4
Figure 4
PCA results of the n-alkanes (n-C15-n-C35) in authentic (○ ) and commercial (□) extra olive oils. By plotting the first principal component against the second principal component, the Greek oil (G) is shown to be well resolved from Spanish (S) and Italian (I) oils. Reference [5] with permission from The Royal Society of Chemistry.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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