No abstract

Representatives of the Achillea genus are widely used as foods or nutraceuticals. Considering the increasing demand for herbal dietary supplements with health promoting effects, the objective of this research was to evaluate the chemical composition and biological activities of the essential oils obtained from sixteen Achillea species (A. biebersteinii, A. wilhelmsii subsp. wilhelmsii, A. aleppica subsp. zederbaueri, A. vermicularis, A. monocephala, A. nobilis, A. goniocephala, A. sintenisii, A. coarctata, A. kotschyi subsp. kotschyi, A. millefolium subsp. millefolium, A. lycaonica, A. spinulifolia, A. teretifolia, A. setacea, and A. schischkinii). Anticholinesterase, antiurease, antityrosinase enzymes inhibition, antioxidant, antimicrobial, toxic and cytotoxic activities of obtained essential oils were investigated. DPPH activities were found to be very low in all studied samples, while ABTS and CUPRAC antioxidant activities were found to be moderate. In addition, all samples were found to have moderate anticholinesterase and antimicrobial effects. It has been determined that the studied species have low cytotoxicity and high toxicity. Besides, chemical composition of the essential oils were determined by GC/MS and the results were chemometrically analyzed. The chemometric analyses of Achillea species collected from nine different regions were accomplished by principal component analysis (PCA) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) techniques. According to the PCA analysis, A. nobilis subsp. neilreichii was found to be different from all studied species in terms of essential oil composition. The major components found in these species were piperitone, camphor, α‐terpinene, eucalyptol, artemisia ketone, endo‐borneol, β‐eudesmol and verbenol. The fact that camphor was toxic and found in majority of the studied species stands out as a remarkable result.

In the present study, a GC‐MS method used for quantitative screening of 26 compounds (sclareolide, sclareol, ferruginol, cryptanol, 6,7‐dehydroroyleanone, suginal, 9,10‐dihydro‐7,8‐dimethyl‐2‐(1‐methylethyl) phenanthren‐3‐ol, sugiol, inuroyleanone, 12‐demethylmulticauline, 7α‐hydroxy‐β‐sitosterol, stigmasterol, sitosterol, salvigenin, sinensetin, α‐amyrin, lupeol, lupenone, 3‐acetyl lupeol, 1α,21α‐dihydroxy‐2,3‐(1′1′‐dimethyl‐dioxymethylene) urs‐9(11),12‐dien, uvaol, betulin, pyxinol, lup‐(20),29‐ene‐2α‐hydroxy‐3β‐acetate, betulin 3β, 28β‐diacetate, 21α‐hydroxy,2α,3β‐diacetoxy urs‐9(11),12‐dien) specific to Turkish Salvia species was developed and validated. According to the GC–MS analysis results, Salvia hypargeia Fisch. & C.A. Mey. roots were found to be rich in ferruginol (30787.97 µg/g extract) and lupenone (23276.21 µg/g extract), and leaves in lupeol (20625.92 µg/g extract). Additionally, the essential oil and aroma contents of this species were identified by GC‐MS technique. According to the LC‐MS/MS results, especially S. hypargeia leaf extract was rich in rosmarinic acid (38035.7 µg/g extract) and isoquercitrin (4136.91 µg/g extract). Furthermore, anticholinesterase, antiurease, antityrosinase and antielastase inhibitory, antioxidant, cytotoxic activities of the ethanol extracts, essential oil, and major components of the species were evaluated. Antioxidant potentials of all extracts of this species were quite high in all studied antioxidant methods. Moreover, butyrylcholinesterase and elastase inhibitory capacities of ferruginol, the major component of S. hypargeia roots, were notable. For these reasons, this species has a high potential for food and pharmaceutical industries. Practical applications This new GC–MS method was applied to S. hypargeia Fisch. & C.A. Mey. and it indicated that this species possessed high amount of ferruginol and lupeol, and that this species could be used for their natural sources. According to the results of the activity studies (antioxidant, anticholinesterase, tyrosinase, elastase, and cytotoxic), this method was used to exhibit which compound may be responsible for the activities. This developed and validated method could be easily applied to determine major/active/toxic secondary metabolites of Salvia species which are used and/or could be used in pharmaceutical, cosmetic, and food industries.

In the present study, the essential oil and aroma compositions of Nepeta heliotropifolia (NH) and N. congesta subsp. cryptantha (NC) were determined by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and gas chromatography-flame ionization detector (GC/FID), and their phenolic compounds by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). In addition, antioxidant, cytotoxic, anticholinesterase, urease, and tyrosinase activities of essential oils obtained from NH and NC aerial parts and ethanol extracts prepared from different parts of NH and NC were investigated. The major constituent of water-distilled essential oils was found to be germacrene D (36.7% and 38.5%, respectively), and their main aroma component was eucalyptol (48.0% and 24.7%, respectively). Among the studied parts of NH and NC, their flowers extracts were found to be the richest in phenolic compounds and in which the most abundant compound was rosmarinic acid (8,909.91 and 4,317.20 μg/g, respectively). NH and NC flower extracts exhibited also strong antioxidant activity in DPPH, ABTS, and CUPRAC assays. Among the tested samples, NH essential oil indicated the best cytotoxic effect against PDF, HT-29, and MCF-7 (IC 50 52.34, 25.89, and 44.70 μg/ml, respectively), and the highest butyrylcholinesterase (77.21 ± 1.12% inhibition) and moderate acetylcholinesterase (41.36 ± 0.69% inhibition) inhibitory activities. Practical applicationsThis is the first report on the essential oil and aroma compositions, the phenolic compounds, the antioxidant with total phenolic and flavonoid contents, cytotoxic, anticholinesterase, urease, and tyrosinase activities of Nepeta heliotropifolia and N. congesta subsp. cryptantha, except for their essential oil compositions. The reported results suggested that Nepeta heliotropifolia and N. congesta subsp. cryptantha flowers being rich in rosmarinic acid and having strong antioxidant potential, and NH essential oil possessing significant cytotoxic and butyrylcholinesterase inhibitory effect could be source for nutraceutical, food, and drug industries. K E Y W O R D Saroma, biological activities, essential oil, LC-MS/MS, Nepeta, phenolic compound 2 of 12 | AKDENIZ Et Al.

The purpose of the present work was to calculate the phenolic and the fatty acids profiles by LC-MS/MS and GC/MS with their antioxidant, anticholinesterase and antimicrobial activities, and aflatoxin contents of Malva neglecta and Malvella sherardiana. The phenolic contents of M. neglecta and M. sherardiana were determined by LC-MS/MS. Malic and 4-OH benzoic acids were found to be the most abundant compounds in M. neglecta and M. sherardiana, respectively. On the other hand, essential oils and fatty acids composition were determined by GC/MS analysis. The methanol extracts of the plants showed the highest effect in all antioxidant assays of this study. The methanol extract of M. neglecta showed the highest activity among the petroleum ether, acetone, methanol and water extracts against acetyl-and butyryl-cholinesterase enzymes (53.68% and 63.95% inhibition ratio, respectively). The acetone extracts of M. neglacta and M. sherardiana exhibited moderate activity against C. albicans with 18 and 17 mm inhibion zone diameter, respectively. The results of the present study is also showed that the M. neglecta and M. sherardiana can also be used as a food source due to its high phenolic acid content and good antioxidant property. Also, the samples were aflatoxin free.