Occurrence of fatty acid chlorohydrins in jellyfish lipids.

Fatty acid chlorohydrins are characterized as lipid components of an edible jellyfish. The four isomers 9-chloro-10-hydroxypalmitic acid, 10-chloro-9-hydroxypalmitic acid, 9-chloro-10-hydroxystearic acid, and 10-chloro-9-hydroxystearic acid were identified by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry comparison of the methyl esters and their trimethylsilyl derivatives with known synthetic samples. Two additional isomers, 11-chloro-12-hydroxystearic acid and 12-chloro-11-hydroxystearic acid, were also found in the lipid by the identification of the expected mass spectral fragments of the trimethylsilyl (Me3Si) derivative of their methyl esters. These six isomeric compounds represented approximately 1.4% of the total extractable jellyfish lipid and were released from the lipid as methyl esters by boron trifluoride-methanol treatment. These isomers account for only about 30% of the organic chlorine in the lipid. Evidence is given that the remaining organic chlorine is also present as fatty acid chlorohydrins containing more than one hydroxyl group.