Aromatic Plants of Tropical West Africa. X. Volatile Constituents of<i>Zanthoxylum zanthoxyloides</i>Lam. Leaves and Fruit Pericarps from Benin

Abstract

Abstract The essential oils of leaves and fruit pericarps of Zanthoxylum zanthoxyloides were analyzed by GC and GC/MS. The leaf oil contained only monoterpene hydrocarbons (98.2%); among them, α-pinene (26.5%), myrcene (30.0%) and (E)-β-ocimene (31.9%) were most predominant. The composition of the fruit oil is more diverse, with 85.5% of monoterpenoids and a fairly large proportion of oxygenated compounds (30.9%), among which linalool (11.3%) and geranial (9.5%) were the most abundant. Both the leaf and fruit oils contained fairly large amounts of (E)-β-ocimene 31.9% and 41.5%, respectively.