Oral Functional Character Determination of Olive Oils for New Olive Cultivar Candidates Obtained by Cross Breeding

Abstract

This research is aimed to generate olive oils with increased functional properties and nutrient content. In this research, fruitsand oils of 9 hybrid olive genotypes were used as material which was harvested from olive cross breeding parcel in AtatürkCentral Horticultural Research Institute (Yalova/TURKEY). These genotypes were generated by crossing Turkish (Edinciksu,Gemlik and Uslu) and foreign (B. D’espagne and Lucques) olive cultivars during cross breeding studies of a national project.Maturation index and oil content of their fruits and dl-alpha tocopherol and total phenol content, fatty acid composition, omega-6:omega-3fatty acid ratio and total antioxidant activities of their oils were evaluated. Oils were obtained from fruit of olivegenotypes by cold pressing. Maturation index and oil content of genotypes were determined between 4,2-5,8 and 15,28-20,66(%). Total phenolic content and antioxidant activity of oils were 85,32-161,52 mg/kg gallic acid equivalent and 301,52-731,65µM/kg trolox equivalent. Omega-6/omega-3 fatty acid ratio of oils was between 7,35 and 10,72. These results showed that itis possible to develop and register new olive varieties which have olive oils with improved functional properties by this crossbreeding and selection study.