Essential oil compositions of wild and cultivated Achillea millefolium L. subsp. elbursensis

The genus Achillea has 19 species of herbaceous, perennial and aromatic plant in Iran. This genus of compositae family has complex characteristics. Chamazolene is a major component of essential oil of inflorescence and leaf, reported to be used in food, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical industries. A. millefolium L. subsp. elbursensis is an endemic subspecies of Iran and no studies have been conducted on the cultivation of this species; therefore a preliminary study was conducted on the cultivation and its effect on secondary metabolites. For this purpose, the seeds of Achillea were collected from Dizine area in October 2016. The seeds of Achillea were cultivated in a greenhouse at the beginning of March and seedlings were transplanted to the farm in late April 2017.At flowering stage in August, aerial parts were collected in two consecutive years to obtain the essential oils. To compare the essential oil of cultivated samples with habitat samples, the aerial parts of Achillea were collected from Dizin at the flowering stage in August 2017. The plant parts including leaf and inflorescence were dried in laboratory and were crushed to particles. The essential oils were obtained by hydrodistillation and were analyzed by GC-FID and GC/MS. The color of A. millefolium essential oils was dark blue. The yields of A. millefolium essential oils of leaf and inflorescence (w/w dried weight) from habitat samples were 0.11% and 0.53%, respectively, and from cultivated samples were 0.28% and 0.50% in 2017 and 0.26% and 1.30% in 2018, respectively. Chamazulene was the major constituent of leaf (5.7%) and inflorescence (52.5%) oils in the habitat samples. The content of this compound in cultivated samples was 50.6% and 67.1% in the first year, and 59.6% and 71.3% in the second year, respectively. Another major constituents were caryophyllene alcohol, caryophyllene oxide, camphor, borneol and b-eudesmol. Chamazulene as major compound of the oil, found in all aerial parts of cultivated samples, while, it was found only in the inflorescence of wild sample.