Preparation of stabilized essential fatty acid enriched formulations from marine sources for use as nutraceuticals and aquafeed supplements

Abstract

Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) in adequate amount are essential in the diet of marine finfish for larval and broodstock nutrition, and as nutraceutical supplements for human health because of the inability of the animal kingdom to synthesize de novo these fatty acids in adequate levels from precursor molecules. These fatty acids are widely available in a large variety of marine fish, and therefore, they are preferentially used as raw material to prepare PUFA concentrates. This work relates to screen low-value fish for essential PUFAs, especially n-3 fatty acids, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), concentrating these essential fatty acids by chemical and enzymatic process. This study further contemplated to develop n3 PUFA enriched formulation(s) comprising fatty acid concentrate and individual or combination of natural ingredients with potential antioxidant properties to form a stabilized form of concentrated PUFAs. The present study demonstrated that the marine pelagic fish Sardinella longiceps is a valuable source of EPA and DHA, for human diet, as well as the extraction of oil in view of commercial exploitation. The spatial and seasonal variation of this study indicated that oil sardine collected from the Southwest coasts during the monsoon season have superior quality with respect to their fatty acid profile, especially EPA and DHA. newline