PRELIMINARY STUDY ON THE CHARACTERIZATION OF OIL FROM NURSE TETRA (Brycinus nurse) FISH

Fish is an important source of protein providing essential amino acids. Imported fish oil are expensive, scarce and sometimes unavailable. However, extraction of oil from indigenous fish species will provide cheap, abundant and readily available product. This study therefore, aimed at the extraction of fish oil from Brycinus nurse. A total of 1368g of B. nurse was procured from Lake Alau, Borno State. The fish were divided into four samples A, B, C and D respectively. Sample A was oven dried for a period of 60 minutes, at maximum temperature of 70oC, sample B for 90 minutes at a maximum temperature of 96oC, sample C for 60 minutes at maximum of 96oC, and sample D for 90 minutes at a maximum temperature of 70oC. After oven drying, the samples were immediately transferred to mechanical workshop for oil extraction using hydraulic press. The characterization and the quality of fish oil were measured using the acid value, saponification value and relative density. Results showed that the fish oil from samples A, B, C, and D had acid value of 3.57mg/KOH, 3.59mgKOH, 2.9mg/KOH, and 2.75mg/KOH respectively, the saponification value of 82.8mg/KOH/g, 94.42mg/KOH/g, 82.8mg/KOH/g, and 70mg/KOH/g respectively while the relative density was found to be 0.04305 for sample A, 0.04301 for sample B, sample C 0.0433 and sample D 0.04307. It can be concluded that the fish oil values falls within the acceptable standard value which are suitable for application in pharmaceutical and food industries. Therefore, Brycinus nurse has the potential of producing fish oil for domestic and industrial use.