Home – Home – Jornals – Chemistry for Sustainable Development 2007 number 5

The qualitative and quantitative content of fatty acids in leaves and stems of Rhododendron adamsii R. has been for the first time studied using gas chromatography and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. It was shown that the use of preliminary hydrodistillation of plant raw material under investigation allows to remove the compounds interfering the identification and quantitative determination of fatty acids content. There are both non-branched and isostructured fatty acids including polyunsaturated ones containing in plants, with the number of carbon atoms from 12 up to 30 (including odd numbers). Acids with cyclopropane fragment were revealed too, which allows to make the assumption concerning the features of metabolism in this plant. Total content of the acids in leaves is 6.2 mass %, in stems it is amounting to 2.4 mass %.