Fatty acid, triglyceride and tocopherol composition of Algerian Argan (Argania spinosa) fruit seed lipids

Abstract

The main focus of the present work is the analytical study of the fatty acid, triglyceride (TAG) and tocopherol composition of oil extracts from the fruit of Algerian tree Argania spinosa. The four dominant fatty acids (FA) found in the oil are: oleic C18:1 (52.86%), linoleic C18:2 (25.0%), palmitic C16:0 (14.65%) and stearic C18:0 (7.06%). The distribution of FA between the sn-2 and sn-1,3 positions of TAG from the oil was also determined. Unsaturated FA showed a preference for the internal position, as generally found in vegetable oils. The TAG composition was calculated using the lipase hydrolysis. The oil was found to contain trisaturated (0.47%), disaturated (9.3%), monosaturated (43.95%) and triunsaturated (45.20%) FA. Flash chromatography with solvent of increasing polarity yielded 83.42% neutral lipids, 1.56% glycolipids and 2.09% phospholipids. The oil was characterised by a relatively high amount of tocopherols (1027.8 mg/kg). The (γ+β)-tocopherols were the major isomers, with the rest being α- and δ-tocopherols.