Chemical compositions of the essential oils of endemic wild Origanum majorana var. tenuifolium collected from three different locations during flowering and post-flowering phases in North Cyprus, Multivariate Statistical Analyses

Abstract

Wild growing Origanum majorana L. var. tenuifolium Weston was collected from three different locations (Om1: Avtepe, Om2: Alevkayası, Om3: Kozanköy) in North Cyprus. The essential oils were hydrodistilled and chemical composition analyses were simultaneously performed by GC-FID and GC-MS. The average yields of essential oils were 5.46-8.14%. Major compounds of flowering Om1 oil were cis-sabinene hydrate (45.0%) and terpinen-4-ol (11.1%) while those of Om3 (Kozanköy) oil were cis-sabinene hydrate (33.3%), terpinen-4-ol (12.3%) and α-terpineol (11.5%). In the post-flowering stage, the major compounds for Om1 and Om3, respectively, were cis-sabinene hydrate (16.7% and 18.8%), terpinen-4-ol (18.1% and 14.5%) and α-terpineol (23.9% and 20.0%). However, the main compound of the essential oils of the flowering and post-flowering oil of Om2 was α-terpineol (76.9% and 51.6%). Statistical Principal Component (PCA) and Hierarchical Cluster Analyses (HCA) tools demonstrated the composition variations of the essential oils at different times and locations. Om1 and Om3 (HCA similarity level: 98.98%) were similar while Om2 (HCA similarity level: 46.32%) was discordant.

Keywords:

• Origanum majorana var. tenuifolium
• Sweet marjoram
• Essential oil
• Cyprus
• Hierarchical cluster analysis
• Principal component analysis