RESUMEN
OBJECTIVE: To extract and analyze fatty acids in leaves of L. chinense Oliver and L. chinense var. rubrum Yieh. METHODS: The fatty acids were extracted with Soxhlet extractor and identified by the GC-MS method. RESULTS: 31, 26 and 30 components were identified from the leaves of L. chinense, the green leaves and red leaves of L. chinense var. rubrum. There were 19, 14 and 16 kinds of fatty acid in the respective leaves, which accounted for 99.09%, 95.31% and 98.83% of the total extraction, respectively. The main components in the extraction were oleic acid (30.77%, 47.01%, 75.28%), linoleic acid (48.49%, 29.26%, 0%), hexadecanoic acid (9.83%, 8.87%, 11.71%), octadecanoic acid (3.86%, 3.18%, 4.88%) and docosanoic acid (2.37%, 2.17%, 2.58%). CONCLUSION: Many kinds of unsaturated fatty acids exist in leaves of L. chinense Oliver and L. chinense var. rubrum Yieh. The leaves of these two plants can be used as the traditional Chinese medicine.