A Stereospecific Analysis of Triglycerides.

A method is presented for the analysis of the fatty acid compositions in each of the three positions of a triglyceride. Diglycerides are obtained from the triglyceride by lipolysis with pancreatic lipase, and converted to a mixture of Dand L-phosphatidyl phenol. The L-phosphatide is then hydrolyzed by phospholipase A, leaving a lysophosphatide with the fatty acid in position 1, free fatty acid from position 2, and unhydrolyzed D-phosphatidyl phenol. The fatty acid composition in position 3 of the original triglyceride is obtained by calculation. The method was tested on two triglyceride mixtures with known fatty acid distributions. A natural triglyceride, corn oil, was analyzed. The distribution of the major fatty acids between positions l and 3 was found to be nearly random.