Evaluation and Optimization of the Analysis of Fatty Acid Types in Edible Oils by 1H-NMR

In recent years, new different methods for the determination of fatty acid types (FAT) by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) have been developed. Although in general good results have been obtained, these methods employ long acquisition times and a wide variety of approaches and NMR parameters to resolve the FAT. For this reason, we have developed a NMR analysis optimization. This new method was used to evaluate the different H-1-NMR methodologies against gas chromatography-flame ionization detection (GC-FID), considered as the reference method. We have applied our easy and quick methodology to the analysis of three different composition oils: sunflower, olive, and linseed oil. Using our optimized NMR methodology, it was possible to obtain in < 1 min the FAT with the same accuracy and better reproducibility than by GC-FID. Furthermore, a complete H-1-NMR spectrum assignation and evaluation of minor components allows obtaining extra information about the composition, quality, and conservation of the analyzed edible oils.