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Cold plasma treatment as a processing technology to modify peanut oil

Abstract:

Cold plasma technology has been studied to modify the fatty acid structure of vegetable oil. The goal of this study is to identify the effect of plasma reactive species from hydrogen (5%) gas on peanut oil. A sample of peanut oil (250 mL) was treated with high voltage cold atmospheric plasma (HVACP) at 60 kV for a treatment time of 8 h, by triplicate. Plasma generated reactive gas species interact with the sample producing three distinct fractions, gel, solid, and insoluble. FTIR, fatty acid composition and 1H-NMR/13C-NMR techniques were used to characterize the formed product after the HVACP treatment. A hexane insoluble fraction was isolated and analyzed with solid NMR. Results indicated a reduction of polyunsaturated fatty acids, increased content of saturated fatty acids, and the presence of isomers of fatty acids in the structure of peanut oil. The solid fraction showed an increase of saturated fatty acids content from 16.7% to 24.2%, and polyunsaturated fatty acids reduced from 25.6% to 10.6%. This probably due to HVACP aided hydrogenation or Diels-Alder reaction between the conjugated double bonds of unsaturated fatty acids.