Antifungal Activities and Chemical Composition of Wood and Leaf Essential Oils from Cunninghamia konishii

Abstract

In this study antifungal activities of essential oils from wood and leaf and their constituents of Cunninghamia konishii against four wood decay fungi and six plant pathogenic fungi were investigated. GC and GC-MS analyses show that the major compounds of wood essential oil were cedrol and α-pinene, while those of leaf essential oil were α-pinene and p-cymene. Antifungal tests demonstrated the wood oil from C. konishii used against Trametes versicolor, Lenzites betulina, Laetiporus sulphureus, and Gloeophyllum trabeum and leaf oil from C. konishii used against L. sulphureus had strong antifungal activities. Moreover, wood oil used against Rhizoctonia solani, Fusarium solani, Pestalotiopsis funereal, and Ganoderma australe also had strong antifungal activities. Among the seven constituents of wood oil, cedrol displayed the best antifungal properties, indicating that it may be used as potential antifungal agents for the control of fungal diseases in plants.

Keywords:

• Cunninghamia konishii
• cedrol
• essential oil
• wood decay fungi
• plant pathogenic fungi
• antifungal activity

Acknowledgments

Funding for this study was provided by the National Science Council of Taiwan (NSC-97-2313-B-045-MY3) and the Experimental Forest of National Taiwan University (98B02). The authors thank Bioresource Collection and Research Center (BCRC) of the Food Industry Research and Development Institute (Taiwan) for providing the fungus.