palm oil - palm oil

Palm oil, coconut oil, and palm kernel oil are edible plant oils derived from the fruits of palm trees. Palm oil is extracted from the pulp[1] of the fruit of the oil palm Elaeis guineensis; palm kernel oil is derived from the kernel (seed) of the oil palm[2] and coconut oil is derived from the kernel of the coconut (Cocos nucifera). Palm oil is naturally reddish in color because it contains a high amount of beta-carotene.


Detailed description:
Palm oil, palm kernel oil and coconut oil are three of the few highly saturated vegetable fats. Palm oil is semi-solid at room temperatures. Palm oil contains several saturated and unsaturated fats in the forms of glyceryl laurate (0.1%, saturated), myristate (0.1%, saturated), palmitate (44%, saturated), stearate (5%, saturated), oleate (39%, monounsaturated), linoleate (10%, polyunsaturated), and linolenate (0.3%, polyunsaturated). Palm kernel oil and coconut oil are more highly saturated than palm oil. Like all vegetable oils, palm oil does not contain cholesterol (found in unrefined animal fats), although saturated fat intake increases both LDL and HDL[7] cholesterol.
Palm oil is a common cooking ingredient in southeast Asia and the tropical belt of Africa. Its increasing use in the commercial food industry in other parts of the world is buoyed by its lower cost and the high oxidative stability (saturation) of the refined product when used for frying.
History
Palm oil (from the African oil palm, Elaeis guineensis) has long been recognized in West African countries, and is widely used as a cooking oil. European merchants trading with West Africa occasionally purchased palm oil for use in Europe, but since the oil was of a lower quality than olive oil, palm oil remained rare outside West Africa. In the Asante Confederacy, state-owned slaves built large plantations of oil palm trees, while in the neighbouring Kingdom of Dahomey, King Ghezo passed a law in 1856 forbidding his subjects from cutting down oil palms.
Palm oil became a highly sought-after commodity by British traders, for use as an industrial lubricant for machinery during Britain's Industrial Revolution. Palm oil formed the basis of soap products, such as Lever Brothers' (now Unilever) "Sunlight Soap", and the American Palmolive brand.[11] By c. 1870, palm oil constituted the primary export of some West African countries such as Ghana and Nigeria, although this was overtaken by cocoa in the 1880s.cita
Nutrition
Many processed foods contain palm oil as an ingredient.[16]
Palm oil is composed of fatty acids, esterified with glycerol just like any ordinary fat. It is high in saturated fatty acids. Palm oil gives its name to the 16-carbon saturated fatty acid palmitic acid. Monounsaturated oleic acid is also a constituent of palm oil. Unrefined palm oil is a large natural source of tocotrienol, part of the vitamin E family.[17]
The approximate concentration of fatty acids (FAs) in palm oil is as follows:[18]
Fatty acid content of palm oil
Type of fatty acid pct
Palmitic saturated C16
  44.3%
Stearic saturated C18
  4.6%
Myristic saturated C14
  1.0%
Oleic monounsaturated C18
  38.7%
Linoleic polyunsaturated C18
  10.5%
Other/Unknown   0.9%
red: Saturated; orange: Mono unsaturated; blue: Poly unsaturated
Red palm oil
Red palm oil gets its name from its characteristic dark red color, which comes from carotenes such as alpha-carotene, beta-carotene and lycopene—the same nutrients that give tomatoes, carrots and other fruits and vegetables their rich colors.
Red palm oil contains at least 10 other carotenes, along with tocopherols and tocotrienols (members of the vitamin E family), CoQ10, phytosterols, and glycolipids.[19] In a 2007 animal study, South African scientists found consumption of red palm oil significantly decreased p38-MAPK phosphorylation in rat hearts subjected to a high-cholesterol diet.[20]
Since the mid-1990s, red palm oil has been cold-pressed and bottled for use as cooking oil, and blended into mayonnaise and salad oil.[21] Red palm oil antioxidants like tocotrienols and carotenes are also fortified into foods for specific health use and anti-aging cosmetics.[22][23][24]
In a 2004 joint-study between Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research and Malaysian Palm Oil Board, the scientists found cookies, being higher in fat content than bread, are a better vehicle for red palm oil phytonutrients.[25]
In a 2009 study, scientists in Spain tested the acrolein emission rates from the deep frying of potatoes in red palm, olive and polyunsaturated oils. They found higher acrolein emission rates from the polyunsaturated oils. The scientists characterized red palm oil as "mono-unsaturated".[26] It gives an attractive colour to french fries.[27]
Refined, bleached, deodorized palm oil
Palm oil products are made using milling and refining processes: first using fractionation, with crystallization and separation processes to obtain solid (stearin), and liquid (olein) fractions. Then melting and degumming removes impurities. Then the oil is filtered and bleached. Next, physical refining removes smells and coloration, to produce refined bleached deodorized palm oil, or RBDPO, and free sheer fatty acids, which are used as an important raw material in the manufacture of soaps, washing powder and other hygiene and personal care products. RBDPO is the basic oil product sold on the world's commodity markets, although many companies fractionate it further into palm olein, for cooking oil or other products.[28]
Splitting of oils and fats by hydrolysis, or under basic conditions saponification, yields fatty acids, with glycerin (glycerol) as a byproduct. The split-off fatty acids are a mixture ranging from C4 to C18, depending on the type of oil/fat.[29][30]
Uses
Derivatives of palmitic acid were used in combination with naphtha during World War II to produce napalm (aluminum naphthenate and aluminum palmitate).
Many processed foods contain palm oil as an ingredient.
Biodiesel

Palm oil, like other vegetable oils, can be used to create biodiesel, as either a simply processed palm oil mixed with petrodiesel, or processed through transesterification to create a palm oil methyl ester blend, which meets the international EN 14214 specification. Glycerin is a byproduct of transesterification. The actual process used to