Amr E. Edris*, Leopold Jirovetz, Gerhard Buchbauer, Zapriana Denkova, Albena Stoyanova and Alexander Slavchev

Abstract: The chemical composition of a Salvia officinalis L. (sage) essential oil from Egypt has been analyzed by GC and GC/MS. Twenty-eight volatiles were identified, and camphor (25.1%), α-thujone (22.2%) and β-thujone (17.7%) were found as main compounds. These analytical results were correlated with olfactoric evaluations for quality control of this sage oil. Furthermore, the oil, some of its terpene components, a reference compound and two commercial antibiotics were screened against several microorganisms to determine the antimicrobial activity of S. officinals from Egypt.

In continuation of an international project in the field of combined data interpretation of composition analysis, aroma evaluation and antimicrobial activity testings (1-3), the essential oil of Salvia officinalis L. from Egypt was investigated. Sage (Salvia officimalis L., Lamiaceae), is a perennial subshruby aromatic plant native to the Mediterranean regions. It is also abundant on the Dalmation coast, areas of Adriatic Sea, Croatia and Albania (4). Sage oil possesses a sharp camphoraceous, thujone-like aroma (5) and is therefore used in the fragrance industry. The oil of S. officinalis is also known for its medicinal- biological activities, such as antimicrobial and fungicidal effects (6-8). The chemical composition of sage oil from different geographical origins has been the subject of many studies (9-14). The major constituents of different sage oils include a-thujone, b-thujone, camphor and 1,8-cineole, which determine also their chemotypes (15). In addition, more than 300 volatiles were also identified as components of essential oils of Salvia officinals (16). To the best of our knowledge, no combined interpretation of data from GC and GC/MS analysis, olfactoric evaluation and antimicrobial testings (using agar diffusion and agar dilution method, both) have been done on sage oil of Egyptian origin.