Lipophilic profile of mature seeds of unconventional edible tree legumes

Several tree legume species’ ( Caesalpinia pulcherrima , Enterolobium cyclocarpum , Leucaena leucocephala , Pithecellobium dulce , Samanea saman , Sesbania grandiflora and Tamarindus indica ) mature seeds were investigated for their lipophilic fraction profile. The oil yield ranged 2.1–14.9%. Linoleic acid was generally dominant (31.86–62.28%), followed by oleic (14.95–33.84%) and palmitic (7.21–17.54%) acid. Total tocochromanol content ranged 41.7–326.0 mg 100 g −1 oil. Tocopherols (Ts), especially α-T (23.0–197.8 mg 100 g −1 oil) and γ-T (7.3–264.0 mg 100 g −1 oil), dominated, and the seeds either did not contain tocotrienols or the content was negligible. Total carotenoid content ranged 2.1–11.8 mg 100 g −1 oil. Only C. pulcherrima and P. dulce contained squalene. The total sterol content ranged 94–1810 mg 100 g −1 oil, and the seeds contained mostly β-sitosterol, Δ5-stigmasterol, campesterol and cycloartenol. Although the oil yield is too low for commercial oil production, some of the studied species ( C. pulcherrima, L. leucocephala and T. indica ) could be considered as bioactive compound-rich oil sources.