Author(s):
Morales, Patricia 
; Ferreira, Isabel C.F.R. ; Carvalho, Ana Maria ; Sánchez Mata, María de Cortés ; Cámara Hurtado, Montaña ; Tardío, Javier
Date: 2012
Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/10198/7373
Origin: Biblioteca Digital do IPB
Subject(s): Wild edible vegetables; Fatty acids; Gas-Chromatography; Nutritional parameters
Description
Polyunsaturated fatty acids play an important role in human nutrition, being associated with
several health benefits. The analyzed vegetables, in spite of his low fat content, lower than
2 %, presents a high proportion of PUFA of n-3, n-6 and n-9 series, such as α-linolenic,
linoleic, and oleic acids, respectively. Wild edible plants contain in general a good balance
of n-6 and n-3 fatty acids. The present study tries to contribute to the preservation and
valorization of traditional food resources, studying the fatty acids profile of twenty wild
vegetables by GC-FID. Results show that species in which leaves are predominant in their
edible parts have in general the highest PUFA/SFA ratios: Rumex pulcher (5.44),
Cichorium intybus (5.14) and Papaver rhoeas (5.00). Due to the low n-6/n-3 ratios of the
majority of the samples, they can be considered interesting sources of n-3 fatty acids,
especially those with higher total fat amount, such as Bryonia dioica, Chondrilla juncea or
Montia fontana, with the highest contents of α-linolenic acid (67.78, 56.27 and 47.65%,
respectively). The wild asparaguses of Asparagus acutifolius and Tamus communis stand
out for their linoleic acid content (42.29 and 42.45%, respectively). All these features
reinforce the interest of including wild plants in diet, as an alternative to the variety of
vegetables normally used.
