LEAF VOLATILE OIL CONSTITUANTS OF SCHINUS TEREBINTHIFOLIUS AND SCHINUS MOLLE FROM TUNISIA

Members of the genus Schinus mainly S. terebinthifolius (Brazilian pepper tree) and S. molle (Peruvian pepper tree) have long been recognized as a consolidate so urces of functional ingredients namely essential oi ls and phenols. Despite the substantial data on the volati le oil constituents of their fruits, the leaf volat ile fraction has not received much interest. Consequently, the aim o f the present study is to analyse the chemical comp osition of the essential oils of the aforementioned species. The Results show that the hydrodistillation of air dried leaves yielded a pale yellowish oil with pung ent and pepper like aroma in 0.75 and 1.06% (w/w dw) for S. terebinthifolius and S. molle, respectively. In both oil samples, monoterpenes hydrocarbons were the most represented class of volatile. Amongst their derivati ves, α-phellandrene (46.64‐22.16%), β-phellandrene (28.53‐6.49%), α-pinene (4.94‐5.20%), and β-myrcene (5.04‐0.84%) were the main components. Even if the oil samples showed the same main constituents, ther e was a considerable qualitative and quantitative differe nce. In summary, both species could be considered as pot ential sources of volatile oil because of their hig her essential oil yields. Such feature appears to be characterist ic of the genus Schinus . Moreover, the occurrence of some volatile compounds (e.g α-phellandrene, α-pinene, β-myrcene and β-caryophyllene) with documented biological activities could justify the traditional uses of th ese species.