ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates that enantiomers of sulfur-containing glycerides could be quantified by reasonable sensitivity using optical rotatory dispersion and circular dichroism, in contrast to natural triacylglycerols. Most glycerides in nature contain acyl groups linked via ester bonds to the glycerol moiety as in triacylglycerols and diacyl phospholipids. In the intestinal digestion and absorption, specificity versus enantiomeric glycerides may be exerted at different stages of the process, such as lipolysis, transport through the intestinal wall, and synthesis of intestinal lipoproteins. Fat absorption has been extensively studied by feeding animals with different fats and measuring the appearance of fat in chyle and feces. 1-Alkyl-2,3-diacylglycerol is the most abundant neutral ether lipid in nature, and it is especially prominent in some species of fish and in tumor tissue. Glycerol by itself is not optically active, but if groups attached to the primary hydroxyls of glycerol differ from each other structurally, the compound can be resolved into two enantiomeric forms.
