ANA ALIMPIC¹*, DEJAN PLJEVLJAKUŠIC², KATARINA ŠAVIKIN², VLADO MATEVSKI^3,4, PETAR D. MARIN¹, SONJA DULETIC-LAUŠEVIC¹
*Corresponding author
1. Institute of Botany and Botanical Garden “Jevremovac”,  Faculty of Biology, University of Belgrade, Takovska 43, Belgrade, Serbia, 
2. Institute for Medicinal Plants Research “Dr. Josif Pancic”, Tadeuša Košcuška 1, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia,
3. Institute of Biology, Faculty of Natural sciences and mathematics, University “Ss. Cyril and Methodius”, 1000 Skopje, Macedonia
4. Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 1000 Skopje, Macedonia

Abstract

Numerous Salvia species were proven to be biologically active due to their chemical composition, and also promising in searching for new medicinal, cosmetics, or food ingredients of natural origin. The chemical composition of the essential oils of endemic species Salvia jurisicii as well as of S. amplexicaulis growing wild in Macedonia was analyzed using GC-FID and GC-MS. The main class of compounds in S. jurisicii oil were sesquiterpenes, consisting of spathulenol (12.3%), ß-bourbonene (7.0%), n-nonanal (5.1%), ?-muurolene (4.8%) and thujopsan-2-?-ol (4.5%) as dominant components. Sesquiterpenes were also the most abundant class in S. amplexicaulis oil, with caryophyllene oxide (11.3%), germacrene D (7.8%), thujopsan-2-?-ol (7.0%), germacra-4(15),5,10(14)-trien-1-?-ol (5.4%), ?-cadinol (5.3%) and spathulenol (5.1%) as the most abundant components.

INTRODUCTION

Essential oils have been widely used since the middle ages for bactericidal, antiviral, fungicidal, antiparasitic, insecticidal, medicinal and cosmetic applications, especially nowadays in sanitary, pharmaceutical, cosmetic, food and agricultural industries (1,2). It contains a variety of volatile molecules such as terpenes and terpenoids, phenol-derived aromatic and aliphatic components (2). Pharmacological investigations showed its antioxidant, antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral, cytotoxic, antiinflammatory and tumorigenesis-preventing and other activities (2-5) as well as ecological significance such as pest-toxic and repellent activity (3).