Characterization of vegetable oils: detailed compositional fingerprints derived from electrospray ionization fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry.

Adulteration of vegetable oil is of concern for both commercial and health reasons. Compositional based fingerprints can potentially reveal both the oil source and its possible adulteration. Here, electrospray ionization (ESI) Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR MS) resolves and identifies literally thousands of distinct chemical components of commercial canola, olive, and soybean oils, without extraction or other wet chemical separation pretreatment. In negative-ion ESI FT-ICR MS, the acidic components of soybean oil are easily distinguished from those of canola and olive oil based on relative abundances of C(18) fatty acids, whereas olive oil differs from canola and soybean oil based on relative abundances of tocopherols. In positive-ion ESI FT-ICR MS, the three oils are readily distinguished according to the relative abundances of di- and triacylglycerols with various numbers of double bonds in the fatty acid chains. We demonstrate the detection of soybean oil as an adulterant of olive oil, based on relative abundances of members of each of several chemical families. We suggest that the detailed chemical compositions of vegetable oils can be used to characterize them and to detect and identify adulterants.