Separation of wax esters from olive oils by high-performance liquid chromatography

To detect adulteration of olive oil with solvent-extracted oils, the determination of the wax ester content has become more important during recent years. Hence, a greater number of wax ester analyses need to be performed by quality control laboratories. The most common method in use requires a liquid chromatographic (LC) separation of the less polar fraction, which contains the wax esters, from the glyceride matter on a hand-filled silica gel column. The aim of this project was to verify the possibility of replacing LC with high-performance liquid chromatography by taking advantage of the greater reliability and repeatability of this technique, as well as of the possibility of making the separation automatic. The paper describes how to perform the analysis and the statistical test that was carried out; furthermore, a comparison has been made with the usual method and results are in good agreement.