During frying, fats and oils undergo degradation with the formation of polar compounds. Among these are polymeric triglycerides, as well as oxidized monomeric triglycerides. The last group has been related to several diseases and contains groups including epoxy, keto and hydroxy groups of importance from a quantitative point of view. In this study, monoepoxyacids, monoketoacids and monohydroxyacids were quantified in partially hydrogenated soybean oil, soybean oil and palm oil, after heating for 25 hours, at 180 °C, in frying experiments. The determination was carried out by gas chromatography after fat derivatization to fatty acid methyl esters at room temperature and concentration of the compounds of interest by solid phase extraction on silica cartridges. Quantitative analyses of polar fatty acids were also obtained by combination of adsorption and size exclusion chromatography. The major content corresponded to polymeric compounds. Amounts ranging from 3.30 to 8.24; from 1.51 to 4.32 and from 3.42 to 8.71 mg.g-1 were found for monoepoxyacids, monoketoacids and monohydroxyacids, respectively, for samples containing polar compounds between 20.8 and 44.1%. The results suggested that monounsaturated oils have a higher tendency to the formation of oxidized monomers while polyunsaturated oils have a higher tendency to the formation of polymers.
epoxy fatty acids; frying oils; hydroxy fatty acids; keto fatty acids; polar compounds; polymers
