Essential Oil Components in Plant Organs of Japanese Spicebush

Japanese spicebush (Lindera obtusiloba Blume, Lauraceae), which grows wild in mountainous areas of Korea, Japan and Northeast China, is known for odd-shaped leaves that are a light green color in the spring, a dark green color in the summer, and a vivid gold color in the fall. In Korea, the plant stem and bark have been used in traditional medicine and as an insect repellant, while spring leaves were used in making cookies and tea and the seed essential oil was used for lamplight and hair oil. To understand the multiple uses of plant organs, this study examined the essential oil from flowers, leaves, stems, and roots from plants collected in GyeonyGii-Do, located in the northern part of South Korea. The essential oils were obtained by steam distillation/extract methodology using a Likens-Nickerson apparatus. Each extracted oil was analyzed by gas chromatography-mass spectrophotometry using an Agilent 6890 N GC connected to a Agilent 5975D (Agilent, U.S.A.). A HP-INNOwax polyethylene glycol capillary column (30 m × 0.25 mm) was used and the constituents were identified by comparison of the spectral data with that in the NIST mass spectral library, ver. 2.0 (NIST, U.S.A.). The essential oil content of the plant organs varied with the flower (0.25% F.Wt.) and young stem (0.23% F.Wt.) containing a higher concentration of oil than the leaf (0.08%, F.Wt.), old stem (0.05% F.Wt.) and root (0.05% F.Wt.) Main oil constituents were α-phellandrene and β-phellandrene in flower oil, caryophyllene in leaf oil, limonene in the stem oil, and camphene in the root oil.