2022 Volume 22 Issue 8 Pages 381-387
“Yuton” is a Japanese traditional carpet, consisting mainly of Japan paper and perilla oil. Yuton has the unique property that its strength and repellency become the highest after 20-30 years of use. In this review, some features of thermochemolysis-gas chromatography (thermochemolysis-GC) in the presence of organic alkali are first presented. Then, applications of thermochemolysis-GC to structural analysis of perilla oil components in yuton were described. The chromatograms of yuton samples showed characteristic peaks of dimethyl esters of dicarboxylic acids, such as suberic and azelaic acids. Furthermore, it was revealed that these dicarboxylic acid components were originated from the network structures of oxidized perilla oil, based on thermochemolysis-GC measurements of yuton model samples. These results suggest that the network structures are also formed on the surface of yuton increasingly over prolonged periods of time, which in turn, give rise to its unique properties.
