Fat Is Solid in Room Temperature

As we learn in lecture, that fats are solid at room temperature, and oils are liquid at room temperature. How is this even possible? Olive oil contains 100% fat, but it is still liquid at room temperature. Also we know butter, which is always solid at some restaurant.

The main reason why butter stays solid but olive oil does not is that how many double bonds are inside each kind of fats and how many hydrogen atoms each kind of fats possess. As we know, fatty acids attach with three carbon backbone. To fully answer this question, we need to understand what saturated and unsaturated fatty acids are. Saturated fatty acids are coming from mostly animals. This kind of fat is bad for human body. Unsaturated fatty acids, on the other hand, is good for human body. They can be found mostly in vegetables. In saturated fatty acids such as butter, there are not any double bonds in between the carbon backbone. This could allow hydrogen atoms easily pass through and stick with the fat molecule. If more hydrogen atoms stick with the fat molecule, this fat will become saturated. This will make a fat molecule into rigid structure, and that is why butter stay solid at room temperature. Therefore, the reason why olive oil is not solid at room temperature is that it contains 100% unsaturated fats. In unsaturated fats, fat molecules have more than one double bond, as well as less amount of hydrogen atoms in their structure. The double bonds that inside of this molecule will create some space, but there just are not enough hydrogen atoms to fill those empty space. Therefore, this make unsaturated fat having a loosen structure resulting in stay liquid at room temperature.

In conclusion, the main reason why butter stays solid but olive oil stays liquid is depending on the amount of double bonds and hydrogen atoms inside its molecule.