Isolation and Characterization of Virgin Olive Oil Phenolic Compounds by HPLC/UV and GC‐MS

Abstract

ABSTRACT This research examined the phenolic fraction of extra virgin olive oil samples from Lianolia variety olives grown in the region of Preveza, Greece. Phenolic compounds were extracted from oil samples, separated by reversed‐phase high‐performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), and characterized by gas chromatography‐mass spectrometry (GC‐MS). Both simple and complex phenols were detected with the latter being the most abundant. 3–4‐Dihydroxyphenyl ethanol (hydroxytyrosol) and p‐hydroxyphenylethanol (tyrosol) predominated among the simple phenols. Complex phenolic compounds were further separated by preparative HPLC and analyzed by GC‐MS before and after hydrolysis. The presence of hydroxytyrosol and tyrosol derivatives was confirmed. Both derivatives were always present in greater quantities and made up an average exceeding 70% in all samples analyzed.