Fatty acids of a whitefish ( Coregonus albula ) flesh lipids

Using gas chromatographic‐mass spectrometric methods 50 fatty acid components of the flesh lipids of a fresh‐water whitefish have been examined in detail. The total lipids represented, on average, 3.0% of the wet weight of whitefish fillets. Saturated, monoenoic and polyenoic fatty acids were present in proportions of 31.4, 22.4 and 44.2%, respectively. About half of the total saturated acids was composed of palmitic acid (16:0, 16.1 %), which is generally abundant in fish lipids. The proportion of saturated iso ‐ and ante iso ‐acids was 2.9%. The major monoenoic acid was oleic acid (18:1,ω9 10.6%), whereas the monoenoic C 20 ‐acids were present only in minor amounts and the monenoic C 22 ‐acids were not detected at all. The polyenoic fatty acids were predominantly of ω3 series with docosahexaenoic (22:6ω3, 9.4%) and cicosapentaenoic (20:5ω3, 7.7%) acids as the major components. Linoleic (18:2ω6), linolenic (18:3ω3), octadecatetraenoic (18:4ω3) and arachidonic (20:4ω6) acids were also present in remarkable proportions each amounting to about 4.5% of the total fatty acids.