Development of chromatographic method for the determination of degree of polymerisation of polyglycerols and polyglycerol fatty acid esters

From polyglycerol samples, pure standards of Mi and tetraglycerol were obta ined using a column chromatographic technique. Polyglycerols were derivatis ed to trimethyl silyl derivatives to obtain gas chromatographic identificat ion of all linear, branched and cyclic diglycerol isomers and all linear an d branched triglycerols. Moreover, quantitative gas chromatographic analysi s of the di-, tri- and tetraglycerol content of a polyglycerol sample was d eveloped. Finally a method to characterise, on a quantitative basis, the polyglycerol content of polyglycerol fatty acid esters was developed. It consisted of s aponifying the esters, without affecting the degree of polymerisation of th e polyglycerols, followed by gas chromatographic analysis of the isolated p olyglycerol fraction.