Sea remoteness effect on chemical composition of leaf essential oils of Pistacia lentiscus L. from wild populations in northern Tunisia

Abstract

The leaf essential oil obtained from five populations of Pistacia lentiscus L., growing wild in northern Tunisia, was analyzed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Twenty-one components of the essential oil have been identified. P. lentiscus essential oils (PLEOs) mainly contained monoterpene hydrocarbons (77.96%). α-pinene, limonene, γ-terpinene, and β-pinene were the major compounds of this class. Sesquiterpene hydrocarbons constituted 15.71% of the essential oil, with δ-cadinene (5.69%) and germacrene D (4.26%) as the main compounds. The amount of oxygenated monoterpene was low and was only represented by terpinen-4-ol (6.06%) and bornyl acetate (0.28%). According to the dominant compounds, three chemotypes could be reported in PLEOs. PLEOs were found to possess antioxidant and antibacterial activities. These varied significantly among populations. In fact, the IC50 of the 1-Diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl radical (DPPH) scavenging activity values ranged from 10.26 μg/ml to 56.02 μg/ml. Moreover, Gram positive strains were more sensitive to PLEOs than Gram negative strains.