Determination of essential oil component composition of common sunflower marginal flowers

Abstract

Common sunflower is a valuable crop that is used widely in food industry. The whole plant has a strong aromatic odor. Macroscopic analysis of its raw materials reveals glandular structures, milk vessels, and conceptacles, which allows supposition on presence of volatile components. We have studied essential oil component composition of common sunflower leaves, calathidiums, seeds, and roots earlier. Taking into

consideration the fact that folk medicine uses a tincture of common sunflower marginal flowers as an anti- inflammatory, appetizing, anesthetic, and antispasmodic agent, we studied qualitative composition and

quantitative content of essential oil components of common sunflower marginal flowers for the first time. Essential oil was extracted by the method of hydrodistillation. Using chromatography-mass spectrometry, we determined 30 compounds, 20 of which were identified. The total content of volatile components in essential oil was 598.73 mg/100g. The following substances were among those identified: aromatic compound (para-сymen- 8-ol), monocyclic (α-pinene, α-campholenic aldehyde, terpinene-4-ol, trans-carveol) and bicyclic monoterpenoids (verbenene, verbenol, verbenone, cis- and trans-sabinenehydrate, myrtenol, bornylacetate), acyclic triterpenoid (squalene), monocyclic (germacrene D, β-bisabolene), bicyclic (β-сaryophyllene) and tricyclic (calarene) sesquiterpenoids and saturated hydrocarbons (pentacozane, geptacozane, nonacozane). It was verbenol from the group of bicyclic monoterpenoids (105.16 mg/100g), calarene from the group of tricyclic sesquiterpenoids (48.42 mg/100g), and germacren-D from the group of monocyclic sesquiterpenoids (42.06 mg/100g) that accumulated most. Further studies of chemical composition of common sunflower marginal flowers of and development of herbal drug products on their basis are promising.