Analysis of fatty acid composition in oats from Ankesha Guagusa Woreda, Awi Zone, Ethiopia

Oats are considered the cereal of the future due to their unique lipid composition compared to other cereals. However, there is a paucity of information on the fatty acid composition of oats from Ethiopia. Thus, oats sample was collected from three sub-districts of Ankesha Woreda in the Awi Zone: Den Zuria, Dangula, and Urana, using purposive sampling technique during the 2022 crop season. The Folch method was used to extract the lipids, and the acid-catalyzed derivatization method was employed to convert the fatty acids into fatty acid methyl esters (FAME). Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) was utilized to determine the fatty acids. The results revealed that all oat samples contained a crude fat content of ranging from 4.23-5.64%, In addition, it was noted that there was a total of thirteen fatty acids, seven of which were unsaturated and six of which were saturated. The most common fatty acids in the three sub-district samples were palmitic, linolenic, oleic, stearic, rumenic, gadoleic, and arachidic acids. Palmitic acid was the most abundant fatty acid in the oats, accounting for 43.4–49.6% of the total fatty acid content. The second and third most abundant fatty acids in the oat samples were linoleic and oleic acids, constituting 24.7–28.5% and 8.86–11.6%, respectively. This may indicate that oats are a useful source of nutritionally important fatty acids, and hence their consumption is beneficial in terms of their content of unsaturated fatty acids. Thus, the study noted that there is a slight variation in crude fat content and fatty acids across the sampling districts, but the seeds are richer in both fatty acid and crude fat content compared to the common cereals such as barley and wheat reported elsewhere.