Hydrogenation of vegetable oils minimizing harmful trans acids and enhancing beneficial conjugated linoleic acids using a novel generation of supported catalysts

植物油必须经过氢化、酯交换或分级处理才能获得所需的技术性能和氧化稳定性，以用于各种食品。催化氢化反应涉及一些自然产生的顺式双键的异构化，以形成对健康有害的反式脂肪酸(TFA)，如弹性脂肪酸，而动物瘤胃中的氢化反应产生反式脂肪酸，如共轭亚油酸(CLA)，这是有益和治疗的。即将出台的TFA标签法规正成为食品行业和油脂供应商关注的焦点。对大量植物油的改性只能通过加氢来经济地硬化。为了满足即将到来的反式脂肪酸标签法规的要求，一个有潜力的策略是通过应用催化剂和材料科学的最新发展来设计能够控制加氢反应最终产物的催化剂，从而重新审视传统的加氢过程。这将主要涉及以纳米结构材料为载体的双金属催化剂的开发，以引导部分反式异构化形成共轭亚油酸，从而最大限度地减少不良反式和最大限度地增加良好反式酸，并产生可接受的饱和脂肪酸。对这一过程的进一步改进将使不良交易减少到可以忽略不计的水平。具体地说，这项研究将涉及以纳米材料为载体的新型催化剂的开发，以葵花籽油为原料的加氢/异构化反应和催化剂稳定性的研究，以及对具有重要经济意义的菜籽油加氢/异构化新型催化剂的性能评价。该项目将带来的好处对于饼干公司提供更健康的食品和提高其盈利能力，以及对加拿大油菜籽和种植者、食用油加工行业以及整个农业食品业务都具有非常重要的意义。

Vegetable oils must be modified by hydrogenation, interesterification or fractionation to achieve the desired technical properties and oxidative stability for use in various food products. While catalytic hydrogenation involves isomerization of some of the naturally occurring cis double bonds to form trans fatty acids (TFA) such as elaidic acid which are detrimental to health, hydrogenation in the rumen of animals produces trans fatty acids such as conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) which are beneficial and therapeutic. The impending labeling regulation on TFA is preoccupying the attention of the food industry and fats and oils suppliers. Modification of bulk of the vegetable oils can only be hardened economically through hydrogenation. A strategy that holds potential to meet the requirements of the impending labeling regulation on trans fatty acids is to revisit the conventional hydrogenation process by applying recent developments in catalysts and material science to design catalysts with capabilities to control the end products of hydrogenation reaction. This would involve primarily the development of bimetallic catalysts on nanostructured materials as supports in order to direct part of the trans isomerization towards the formation of CLA, leading to minimization of bad trans and maximization of good trans acids, with acceptable saturated fatty acid production. Further refinements to the process would enable the reduction of bad trans to negligible levels. Specifically, the research would involve the development of novel catalysts supported on nanostructured materials, studies on hydrogenation/isomerization reactions and catalyst stability using sunflower oil, and evaluation of the performance of the novel catalyst for hydrogenation/ isomerization of the economically important canola oil. The benefits that would accrue from this project are highly significant to Biscuit-Leclerc Ltd for providing healthier foods and improving its profitability and to the Canadian canola and growers, the edible oil processing industry as well as Agri-Food Business overall.