Cucumber Seed Oil
INCI Cucumis Sativus Seed Oil. Also: Cucumis sativus seed oil.
Calculate a 100 % Cucumber Seed Oil bar
That is stoichiometry on a measured composition rather than a guess, and it is about as well determined as a published figure: checked against the 35 Codex oils where both fields come from the same standard, the method's median error is 0.90 % and its 90th percentile 2.74 %, with no meaningful bias. The formula page shows the working. If you have a certificate of analysis for your lot, enter its measured value in the calculator and this estimate is set aside.
Published values
| Saponification value | not published |
| Derived from composition | 193.2 ± 3 % mg KOH/g |
| Used by the calculator | 193.2 mg KOH/g (derived) |
| SAP for NaOH | 0.1377 g/g |
| Iodine value | — |
| INS (SAP − IV) | — |
| Melting point | — |
| Unsaponifiable matter | — |
A bar made of 100 % Cucumber Seed Oil
Conventional qualities summed from the fatty-acid groups; a single-oil bar is a reference point, not a recipe.
Fatty-acid profile
| Fatty acid | Published range, % | Used | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Palmitic acid | C16:0 · saturated | 13.65–15.3 (typical 14.98) | 15.0 |
| Stearic acid | C18:0 · saturated | 6.4–11.97 (typical 11.97) | 12.0 |
| Oleic acid | C18:1 | 15.4–18.62 (typical 18.57) | 18.6 |
| Linoleic acid | C18:2 | 54.32–63.9 (typical 54.48) | 54.5 |
Where these numbers come from
Section 2.1 (samples gifted by Botanic Innovations), 2.5 (GC-FID method), Table 2 fatty-acid composition, cucumber column.
GLC area-%, 13 acids summing to 98.28 %; oil content 33.2 %. The 1965 germ/cotyledon datasets on the same page are not used.
Weight-% compositions used for min/max of the four major acids. The other datasets on the page (partial or mis-summed) are not used.
Cited for the rejection only: Table 1 iodine value 87.38 for a 72.11 % linoleic oil (Table 3) is irreconcilable.
The 'typical' values are Table 2 of Li et al. 2020 (Foods 9(8):970, open access), a commercial cold-pressed cucumber seed oil supplied by Botanic Innovations (Spooner, WI, USA), GC-FID on a DB-23 column with area normalisation over the identified peaks: palmitic 14.98, stearic 11.97, oleic 18.57, linoleic 54.48 g/100 g total fatty acids (triplicate). The four sum to 100.00 because only these four were identified: the authors state that the linolenic, arachidic, behenic, lignoceric and other minor acids reported by others were below their detection limit. Min/max add three whole-seed-oil datasets from PlantFAdb: #10419, 'FA and tocopherol composition of Vietnamese oilseeds' (2003; SOFA TAB_014726), 33.2 % oil, palmitic 13.65, stearic 10.41, oleic 18.62 (18:1 delta-9 18.01 plus delta-7 0.61), linoleic 54.32 %, with myristic 0.07, palmitoleic 0.11, alpha-linolenic 0.37, eicosenoic 0.07, arachidic 0.37, C22:2 0.07, behenic 0.06 and lignoceric 0.16 % (sum 98.28 %; these minor acids are not stored because the primary could not detect them); #28881, 'Chinese Oil Plants' (1987), 33.0 % oil, palmitoleic 1.3, palmitic 13.9, linoleic 63.9, oleic 15.4, stearic 6.4 %; #26634, 'Oil Plants in Henan' (1996), 34.0 % oil, palmitic 15.3, linoleic 58.2, oleic 17.3, stearic 7.9 %. So: palmitic 13.7-15.3, stearic 6.4-12.0, oleic 15.4-18.6, linoleic 54.3-63.9 %. SAPONIFICATION AND IODINE VALUE are null: none of these documents prints one for the whole oil (PlantFAdb's only cucumber iodine values, 109.3 and 111.0 from a 1965 study, are for separated germ and cotyledon tissue, not pressed oil); the recorded composition implies about 193 mg KOH/g. READ AND NOT USED: Han et al. 2024 (Food Chem. X 24:101816) give a cucumber seed oil at 72.11 % linoleic with an iodine value of 87.38 g I2/100 g - a 72 % linoleic oil has to measure about 140 - and the same table reports EPA, DHA and arachidonic acid in plant seed oils, so none of its figures are used (this dataset's watermelon record rejects the same paper for the same reason). A Thai survey of cold-pressed oils (Yuenyong et al., Heliyon 7:e06304, 2021) lists 12.69 % erucic acid in cucumber seed oil, which no cucurbit makes, and 19.21 % palmitic in its almond oil; not used. FOR SOAP: a linoleic oil with more stearic acid than most (6-12 %), so slightly firmer than sunflower oil but still soft and conditioning, with the usual rancidity risk at high use. INCI name, CAS and EC numbers are CosIng's.
This record is part of the open ingredient database (ODbL). Found an error or a better primary source? The dataset is on GitHub; corrections with a document link are welcome.