Assessing the capabilities of instrumental techniques aiming at differentiating marine oils is a matter of great importance for both authorities and industries which has been highlighted over 120 years. In this study, different strategies were evaluated by means of principal component analysis (PCA) for their performance in differentiating various marine oils. Triacylglycerols (TAGs) composition and four different profiles including total ion current (TIC) and total mass spectral (TMS) profiles derived from liquid chromatography electrospray single and tandem mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-MS and LC-ESI-MS(2)) were used as the dataset for PCA study. Among these strategies, the tandem TMS profiles from LC-ESI-MS(2) experiments as the dataset demonstrated to be the most rapid and convenient approach for the differentiation of various marine and plant oils investigated and for the representation of the characteristics TAG patterns. This novel approach represents an alternative and promising tool for fingerprinting and differentiating marine oils.
© The Royal Society of Chemistry 2011