Fatty Acid Component of Lipid of Euphausia Superba

Lipids extracted from the raw frozen and boiled-frozen krill, Euphausia superba, harvested in the Antarctic Ocean were identified and quantitated by a combination of thin-layer and gas-liquid chromatography. The lipid contents of E. superba on the wet weight basis were 3.41% of the raw frozen sample and 5.62% of the boiled-frozen sample. There were shown to consist of 0.8% of steryl esters, 27.4% of free fatty acids, 52.3% of triglycerides, 4.7% of sterols, a trace amount of diglycerides, 2.2% of monoglycerides, 6.9% of phospholipids and 4.1% of pigments in the raw frozen sample, and 0.6% of steryl esters, 4.6% of free fatty acids, 76.8% of triglycerides, 4.2% of sterols, 9.2% of phospholipids and 3.5% of pigments in the boiled-frozen sample. The predominant fatty acids contained in total lipids and the fractions of free fatty acids, triglycerides and phospholipids were myristic (5.98-22.16%), palmitic (16.83-30.49%), palmitoleic (5.92-26.31 %), oleic (19.31-29.17%), eicosapentaenoic (0.52-12.59%) and docosatrienoic (0.50-11.74%) acids.