Abstract
Extractives are an important class of compounds in plants because they contribute to many of their physicochemical properties such as color, odor, density, strength, permeability, and hygroscopicity. Moreover, they also possess significant biological activity and are thus an important part of the plants’ defense mechanisms against biotic and abiotic stresses. Tree needles are a rich source of extractives, counting for as much as 40% of their dry weight. In this study, chemical fingerprinting of essential oils and solvent extracts, obtained from the needles of four conifer tree species (i.e., pine, spruce, larch, and juniper), was performed by using ultrahigh-resolution Fourier transform ion cyclotron mass spectrometry. A wide variety of compounds were detected in the oil samples, including mono-, sesqui-, and diterpenes, terpenoids, fatty and resin acids, esters, and different phenolic compounds. Although the main compounds were present in all the four essential oil samples, large variations in their relative abundances were observed. In contrast, pine needle hexane and toluene extracts showed a high content of resin acids, including pinifolic acid, a rare labdane-type diterpene diacid, and its mono- and dimethyl esters. Thus, by selecting a suitable solvent, specific types of compounds may be isolated from tree needles for further biotechnological or medicinal applications.
Highlights
Plants serve as important raw materials in food and nonfood industrial products
Essential oils are complex chemical mixtures of volatile and nonvolatile constituents. These secondary metabolites are important for plants’ defense mechanisms against biotic and abiotic stresses.[5−8] Essential oils are a great reservoir of bioactive compounds, an increased interest in them.[9]
High-resolution Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FT-ICR) mass spectrometry, combined with (−)ESI and (+)APPI was successfully used for direct chemical fingerprinting of essential oils and solvent extracts obtained from four conifer tree species
Summary
Plants serve as important raw materials in food and nonfood industrial products. They are rich sources of nonstructural compounds, which find use in pharmaceutical, cosmetics, agricultural, food, and other related industries.[1,2] These bioactive plant compounds (phytochemicals) are known for their pronounced antioxidant, antifungal, antibacterial, insecticidal, and herbicidal character.[3,4] Bioactive compounds are the main constituents of essential oils, which are obtained via steam distillation or solvent extraction of plant materials, and have a characteristic aroma or fragrance. The amount of diterpenoids was exiguous as compared to monoterpene and sesquiterpene hydrocarbons in all the four samples These results agree well with the previous reports.[58,62,63] Cembrene, abietal, abietadiene, abietatriene, ferruginol, isopimarol, and dehydroabietal are common diterpenoids in essential oils.[58,60−63] Phenylpropanoids were present at low abundance among all the compounds. Resin acids are used in various pharmaceutical applications to produce microcapsules and nanoparticles because of their extremely good film-forming and coating properties, whereas their parent hydrocarbons are frequently used to modify the concept of skin adhesion.[65] Sesquiterpenes were present in the extracts in moderate amounts but their oxygenated derivatives were present only in minor quantities Monoterpene hydrocarbons and their oxygenated compounds were present at low abundance as compared to the other types of terpenoids present in both samples, possibly because of their high volatility.
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