Different edible oils, including safflower, sunflower, rapeseed and olive oils, were submitted to oxidation in a convection oven
with air circulating at 70 C. Their oxidation process was monitored by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy by periodically
collecting duplicate spectra from films of pure oil between two KBr disks. The frequency and absorbance of each infrared band
were automatically registered by a macro program. Classic chemical methods for determining primary and secondary oxidation
products, such as peroxide value and anisidine value respectively, were determined periodically. Changes observed in infrared data
are useful indicators of edible oils oxidative stability and are closely related to changes observed in peroxide and anisidine values in
the course of the oxidation of the samples. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy may be able to substitute classic oxidation
indices in the determination of oxidative stability or antioxidant activity due to its simplicity, low cost and time saving. # 2002
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