Isolation and characterization of wax esters in fennel and caraway seed oils by SPE-GC

A rapid method for the isolation and quantitative determination of wax eate rs in vegetable oils was developed. For the first time wax eaters in oils w ere separated from the triglyceride matrix by means of solid-phase extracti on, which allows rapid sample preparation in parallel and therefore a high sample throughput, The thus obtained wax eater fractions of fennel and cara way seed oils were analyzed by high temperature gas chromatography. GC-MS a nalyses were carried out using electron impact ionization in order to chara cterize the wax ester fraction. With respect to the results of the GC-MS an alyses different isomers of saturated max esters with the same carbon numbe r were observed. Additional monounsaturated wax eaters with an unsaturated fatty acid moiety were identified.