Chemical Composition and Antioxidant and Antimicrobial Properties of the Essential Oil of Hyssopus officinalis L

    Medicinal plants and their extracts are extensively used in nutrition, medicine and food industry. These plants are considered the most important natural antimicrobial antioxidants since they provide rich sources of phenolic compounds, and if resuscitated, they prevent the oxidation process. The present study was conducted to investigate the antimicrobial and antioxidant properties of Hyssopus officinalis essential oil as a chemical preservative. The Hyssopus officinalis plant was collected from the mountainous regions of Kurdistan, Iran. The essential oil was extracted through distillation and analyzed and its components were identified using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The antioxidant effect was evaluated using the diphenylpicrylhydrazyl (DPPH) free radical-scavenging method. The antimicrobial property was assessed using the standard microdilution method to determine minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC). The major components of Hyssopus officinalis essential oil were found to be camphor (23.61%) and β-pinene (21.91%). The obtained results showed that the total phenolic content of this species was 23.16 mg of gallic acid per gram of the essential oil and its IC50 was 11.22 μg/mL. MIC obtained for Escherichia coli was 156.25 and MBC 312.5 μg/mL, while these figures were respectively 312.5 and 625 μg/mL for Listeria monocytogenes. The results obtained indicate the antioxidant activity and antimicrobial power of Hyssopus officinalis essential oil against pathogenic microorganisms. This essence can be used as an antimicrobial substance and a natural antioxidant in pharmaceutical and food industries.