Optimal Production of a Novel Furan Fatty Acid from 7,10-dihydroxy-8(E)-octadecenoic Acid by Heat Treatment

As a specialty oil, furan fatty acids have gained special attentions since they are known to play important roles in biological systems including human. Although several studies reported chemical synthesis of furan fatty acids, their synthesis consisted of complicated chemical multistep with chemical catalysts. Recently, a simple one-step heat treatment method was developed to produce a novel furan fatty acid, 7,10-epoxy-octadeca-7,9-dienoic acid (7,10-EODA) from a dihydroxyl fatty acid 7,10-dihydroxy-8(E)-octadecenoic acid (DOD). In this report we studied about optimization of environmental conditions for the maximum production of 7,10-EODA from DOD by heat treatment. Production of 7,10-EODA was maximized at over $85^{\circ}C$ for at least over 48 hour in hexane. Solvent volume for maximum production should be over 300 mL per 10 mg DOD.