Department of Chemistry and Chemical Technologies (CTC), University of Calabria-UNICAL, Via P. Bucci, Arcavacata di Rende, 87036 Rende, Italy.
Reolì S.r.l., Zona Industriale, Settore 3, 87064 Corigliano-Rossano, Italy.
Int J Mol Sci. 2023 Jan 20;24(3):2090. doi: 10.3390/ijms24032090.
In recent years, the food industry has become increasingly involved in researching vegetable fats and oils with appropriate mechanical properties (ease of transport, processing, and storage) and a specific lipidic composition to ensure healthy products for consumers. The chemical-physical behavior of these matrices depends on their composition in terms of single fatty acids (FA). However, as we demonstrate in this work, these properties, as well as the absorption, digestion and uptake in humans of specific FAs, are also largely determined by their regiosomerism within the TriAcylGlycerols (TAG) moieties (-1,2,3 positions). The goal of this work is to study for the first time vegetable fats obtained directly from a sample of natural cocoa butter (CB) through a process that manipulates the distribution of FAs but not their nature. Even if the initial percentage of each FA in the mixture remains the same, CB derivatives seem to show improved chemical-physical features. In order to understand which factors account for their physical and chemical characteristics, and to check whether or not the obtained new matrices could be considered as valid alternatives to other vegetable fats (e.g., palm oil (PO)), we carried out an experimental investigation at both the macroscopic and molecular level including: (i) Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) analyses to examine thermal features; (ii) rheological testing to explore mechanical properties; (iii) powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) to evaluate the solid-state phases of the obtained fats; and (iv) H and C Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR, 1D and 2D) spectroscopy to rapidly analyze fatty acid composition including regioisomeric distribution on the glycerol backbone. These last results open up the possibility of using NMR spectroscopy as an alternative to the chromatographic techniques routinely employed for the investigation of similar matrices.
近年来，食品行业越来越关注研究具有适当机械性能（便于运输、加工和储存）和特定脂质组成的植物脂肪和油，以确保为消费者提供健康的产品。这些基质的化学物理性质取决于其在单脂肪酸（FA）方面的组成。然而，正如我们在这项工作中所证明的那样，这些特性以及特定 FA 在人体中的吸收、消化和摄取，在很大程度上也取决于它们在三酰基甘油（TAG）部分（-1、2、3 位）中的位置异构体。这项工作的目的是首次研究从天然可可脂（CB）样品中直接获得的植物脂肪，该过程可操纵 FA 的分布而不改变其性质。即使混合物中每种 FA 的初始百分比保持不变，CB 衍生物似乎显示出改善的化学物理特性。为了了解哪些因素决定了它们的物理和化学特性，以及检查所获得的新基质是否可以被认为是其他植物脂肪（例如棕榈油（PO））的有效替代品，我们在宏观和分子水平上进行了实验研究，包括：（i）差示扫描量热法（DSC）分析以检查热特性；（ii）流变学测试以探索机械性能；（iii）粉末 X 射线衍射（PXRD）以评估获得的脂肪的固态相；和（iv）H 和 C 核磁共振（NMR，1D 和 2D）光谱学快速分析脂肪酸组成，包括甘油主链上的位置异构体分布。这些最后结果为使用 NMR 光谱学作为替代常规用于研究类似基质的色谱技术提供了可能性。
