Fatty acid composition, biological activity and authentication of marine fish oil

Abstract

Marine fish oils (MFO) are known as sources of polyunsaturated fatty acids such as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), having beneficial effects on human health. MFO is considered an important raw material in the pharmaceutical, food, and cosmetics industries. It is classified as high price oil; therefore, MFO are subjected to adulteration with low price oils. This review aimed to provide a scientific view of the fatty acid composition, biological activity, and authentication of marine fish oil. Different species of fish have different nutritional content such as triacylglycerols composition, especially DHA, EPA, and lipid-soluble vitamins. Marine fish oil is one of the functional oils that have beneficial effects on human health. Marine fish oil has a high price in the market which is lucrative to be adulterated with lower-priced ones to gain economic profit, therefore reliable analytical methods for detecting the possible adulterated such as combined fourier transform infrared and chemometrics.