Oils, Fats Andwaxes: Supercritical Fluid Chromatography

The analysis and characterization of lipids andwaxes is of great importance in the food industry, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industry, in surfactant and detergent technology and in natural product research. Lipid analysts have always been on the forefront of developments in separation sciences and new techniques in chromatography have often been developed for the separation of lipids. The Rrst application of gas chromatography, for instance, was the separation of fatty acids by James and Martin. Since then, all chromatographic techniques, including capillary gas chromatography (CGC), high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), thin layer chromatography (TLC), capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE), micellar electrokinetic chromatography (MEKC), capillary electrochromatography (CEC) and supercritical Suid chromatography (SFC) have been applied to the analysis of lipids and also waxes which have similar physico-chemical characteristics. It is not possible to give a complete overview of the possibilities and limitations of each of these techniques in comparison to supercritical Suid chromatography for these analytes. For a detailed description of the use of supercritical Suids in the analysis of oils, fats and waxes, we refer to a number of recently published books listed in the Further Reading. The possibilities of both capillary column supercritical Suid chromatography (cSFC) and packed column supercritical Suid chromatography (pSFC) in the analysis of lipids and related compounds will be illustrated. The experiences gained in the authors’ laboratories over the years are summarized.