Abstract
This research focused on obtaining eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA, 20:5 n-3) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, 22:6 n-3) (EPA+DHA) concentrates from refined commercial salmon oil (RCSO). Independent variables of the complexation process were optimized by means of the application of response surface methodology (RSM) in order to obtain the maximum content of such fatty acids (FAs). As a result of employing the optimized conditions for all the variables (6.0, urea:FA content ratio; −18.0 °C, crystallization temperature; 14.80 h, crystallization time; 500 rpm, stirring speed), high contents of EPA and DHA could be obtained from RCSO, achieving increases of 4.1 and 7.9 times in the concentrate, with values of 31.20 and 49.31 g/100 g total FA, respectively. Furthermore, a 5.8-time increase was observed for the EPA + DHA content, which increased from 13.78 to 80.51 g/100 g total FA. It is concluded that RCSO can be transformed into a profitable source of EPA and DHA (EPA+DHA), thus leading to a product with higher commercial value.
Highlights
In recent years, it has been recognized that the consumption of eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA)is associated with a low prevalence of coronary, circulatory, and inflammatory diseases [1,2,3,4].docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) has been associated with fetal development, the prevention of neurodegenerative diseases, and the correct functioning of the nervous system and visual organs in the fetus [5,6,7,8,9,10]
The results show a higher content of EPA and DHA when the total fatty acids (FAs) yield is lower, indicating that this experiment eliminated most of the SFAs and MUFAs from the starting oil, only leaving a small fraction of such acids in the urea non-complexed fraction
As an explanation for this, it could be argued that the urea:FA content ratio has a significant positive effect (p < 0.05) on the concentration of EPA and DHA, probably as a result of increasing the concentration of urea with respect to that of free fatty acids (FFA); this would lead to an increase of the number of adducts formed between the flat structures of SFA and urea molecules, this favoring the formation of hexagonal complexes and crystals [13], and leading to an increased concentration of EPA and DHA in the non-urea complexing solution
Summary
Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) has been associated with fetal development, the prevention of neurodegenerative diseases, and the correct functioning of the nervous system and visual organs in the fetus [5,6,7,8,9,10]. EPA+DHA concentrates may be produced by various methods, such as supercritical fluid chromatography, supercritical fluid fractionation, molecular distillation, silver complexation, enzymatic methods, and urea. Complexation with the urea can be considered as the most efficient method, since polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) may be separated from saturated and monounsaturated ones by means of an economic process at low temperature [13,14,15,16,17,18]. Independent variables of the urea adduction reaction conditions (urea:FA content ratio, crystallization time and temperature, and crystallization stirring speed) were optimized by response surface methodology (RSM) in order to achieve the maximum content of EPA, DHA and EPA+DHA
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