Synthesis of structured phosphatidylcholine containing punicic acid by the lipase-catalyzed transesterification with pomegranate seed oil

Abstract

Incorporation of conjugated linolenic acid (punicic acid; 18:3, 9c,11t,13c) into egg-yolk phosphatidylcholine (PC) in the lipase-catalyzed transesterification process was the aim of this work. Pomegranate seed oil (PSO) containing over 77% of punicic acid was used as an acyl donor and three commercially available immobilized lipases were examined as biocatalysts. The effects of enzyme load, reaction time and molar ratio of substrates (PC:PSO) on the incorporation of punicic acid into the modified PC were tested. In all experiments the best results were obtained using lipase B from Candida antarctica. In optimum conditions (20% of enzyme load; 1:3 PC:PSO molar ratio; 72h), the incorporation of punicic acid into the sn-1 position of PC was 56%. Additionally, the total content of polyunsaturated fatty acids in modified PC was almost 50%.