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Liquid Extraction: Folch

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Encyclopedia of Lipidomics

Definition

Folch’s extraction procedure is one of the most popular methods for isolating lipids from biological samples. It takes advantage of the biphasic solvent system consisting of chloroform/methanol/water in a volumetric ratio of 8:4:3 (v/v/v).

Background

Folch’s method is one of the major contributions to the field of lipid biochemistry by the Catalan biochemist and prominent scientist in the field of neurochemistry Jordi Folch-Pi (1911–1979) (Lees and Pope 2001). Prior to Folch’s method there was no effective way to quantitatively isolate lipids from biological tissue samples. The standard method for lipid extraction from tissues until Folch was Bloor’s method that applied a number of successive extractions using ethanol, ether, and chloroform and/or petrolether (Bloor 1928). This method was very time consuming and the resulting lipid extracts were not free from non-lipid contaminants. Folch, driven by his interest in neurochemistry, developed his famous extraction method in...

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Abbreviations

DAG:

Diacylglycerol

GC-MS:

Gas chromatography/mass spectrometry

LC-MS:

Liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry

MTBE:

Methyl-tert-butyl ether

PA:

Phosphatidyl acid

PC:

Phosphatidylcholine

PE:

Phosphatidylethanolamine

PG:

Phosphatidylglycerol

PI:

Phosphatidylinositol

TAG:

Triacylglycerol

References

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Center Borstel, Parkallee 1-40, 23845, Borstel, Germany

    Lars F. Eggers & Dominik Schwudke

Authors
  1. Lars F. Eggers
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  2. Dominik Schwudke
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dominik Schwudke .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine Centre for Life Sciences, Singapore, Singapore

    Markus R. Wenk

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Eggers, L.F., Schwudke, D. (2016). Liquid Extraction: Folch. In: Wenk, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Lipidomics. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7864-1_89-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7864-1_89-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-007-7864-1

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