High performance characterization of triacylglycerols in milk and milk-related samples by liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry

tIn this work, ultra high performance liquid chromatography was used for the characterization of non polar lipids (triacylglycerols) in milk samples of different origin, as well as milk-derivatives. For tackling sucha task, three core shell type octadecylsilica columns were serially coupled, reaching a total stationaryphase length of 45 cm, using acetonitrile-isopropanol gradient elution allowing triacylglicerol separa-tion according to increasing partition number. The employment of an ion-trap-time-of-flight detectionin conjunction with atmospheric-pressure chemical ionization mass spectrometry was carried out topositively identify a number of 243 different triacylglycerols containing up to 22 fatty acids, with 2-22carbon atom alkyl chain length, and 0-3 double bonds. This work reports an extensive characterization of the triacylglycerol fraction in milk and milk-related samples of different sources.