Page 4 - Technical Saw Palmetto Booklet

MTC Industries, Inc.
Herbsine Bioengineering Co., Ltd.

1. Content of Fatty Acids

Fatty acids are the core components of saw palmetto oil and the content is as high as
80-95% (USP). Its unique fatty acid composition determines the difference with other
vegetable oils, and also brings unique pharmacological effects. USP defines the range of
concentration of lauric acid to the concentration of the respective fatty acid (9 individual
fatty acid) to identify the authenticity. Starting from USP37, this proportional
relationship is even used to distinguish between carbon dioxide supercritical extraction
and solvent extraction processes.

SN-180401 UV-171023 EE-1800628 USP
Content, % Ratio Content, % Ratio Content, % Ratio Ratio
C6 Caproic acid 1.17 25.50 0.96 30.16 0.66 47.38 9.0-40
C8 Caprylic acid 2.84 10.50 1.93 15.00 1.76 17.77 8.5-17.5
C10 Capric acid 2.15 13.87 2.62 11.05 2.82 11.09 9.0-16
C12 Lauric acid 29.83 1.00 28.95 1.00 31.27 1.00 1
C14 Myristic acid 12.13 2.46 11.23 2.58 10.86 2.88 2.2-2.8
C16 Palmitic acid 8.87 3.36 8.25 3.51 7.81 4.00 2.8-3.9
C18 Stearic acid 1.63 18.30 1.66 17.44 1.82 17.18 13-20
C18:1 Oleic acid 28.43 1.05 28.30 1.02 27.50 1.14 0.60-1.15
C18:2 Linoleic acid 4.82 6.19 4.42 6.55 5.96 5.25 4.0-8.0
C18:3 Linolenic acid 0.56 53.27 0.67 43.21 0.85 36.79 35-60
Total fatty acid 92.83% 88.99% 91.31%
Table-1 Fatty acids content of various saw palmetto oils, Assay by GC

The ratio of red part in table 1 doesn’t comply with USP. We found that regarding fatty
acids, the sample from Europe doesn’t significantly differ from other samples, but the
ratio of 4 fatty acids doesn’t comply with USP. The reason may be that EP only requires
that saw palmetto oil contains NLT 80% of fatty acids and NLT 23% of lauric acid.
However, such product doesn’t comply with USP.

Figure 1 Chromatography of SN-180401

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