A novel chromophoric test for quantifying cholesterol and the major polyunsaturated fatty acids in food and biological samples

Cardiovascular diseases, obesity, diabetes, insulin resistance, cancer and metabolic syndrome, which are closely associated with high accumulation of triglycerides in the body tissues, remain serious causes of human mortality around the world. This is in part due to lack of rapid and sensitive methods to quantify the different fatty acids/triglycerides associated with these diseases. Current methods used by clinicians for serum analyses fail to report the quantitative values of the individual major polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) in molar concentrations but rather express them in percentages. Moreover, low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (LDL-C) a major risk for cardiovascular diseases is estimated from Friedewald Formula (FF). This formula is known to inaccurately estimate the levels of LDL-C especially when serum triglyceride (TG) concentrations of greater than 4.52 mmol/L are obtained. Therefore, a method that can effectively quantify the serum PUFAs and cholesterol simultaneously is essential. Rapid Friedel-Crafts chromogenic acylations of alkene groups at ambient temperatures are shown to be successful selective procedures for the discrimination of various food and biological samples. This chapter will discuss a colorimetric test that quantifies the eight analytes consisting of cholesterol, α-linoleic (LA), linolenic (LNA), arachidonic (AA), eicosapentaenoic (EPA), docosahexaenoic (DHA), conjugated linoleic (CLA), and oleic (OA) fatty acids in a single step in moles/L without separation or extraction. The test is selective towards lipids consisting of -CH=CH-CH2- functional grouUsing knowledge of chemometric techniques, the assay offers a wide variety of applications to simultaneously quantitate the mentioned lipids in various samples. Some of the food and biological samples considered in the application of the chromophoric assay besidehuman serum include meat, milk, nuts, vegetable oils, chicken liver, eggs, and chicken, pizza, cheese, vitamins, and steroids.And copy 2013 Nova Science Publishers, Inc.