Study on Phytochemical diversity and antioxidant properties of extracts from different populations of Perovskia abrotanoides Kar. in Eastern Alborz

This study was conducted to investigate the biochemical diversity and antioxidant properties of three accessions of Perovskia abrotanoides Kar. in eastern Alborz mountain range including Semnan and Mazandaran provinces. Flowering specimens were collected from three natural habitats of Damghan (station 1, 1504 m), Kordmir (station 2, 1672 m) and Shahrud (station 3, 1285 m) in July 2018. The amount of proline, protein, soluble sugars, phenolic compounds, hydrogen peroxide, potassium, copper, zinc, iron, nickel, magnesium, manganese and calcium as well as soil salinity were measured. Methanolic, dichloromethane, ethyl acetate and hexane extracts were extracted by soaking method and the antioxidant activity of the extracts was evaluated using the DPPH radical scavenging capacity. The experiment was conducted as a completely randomized design with 3 replications and the comparison of data means was performed using Duncan's test at a probability level of 5%. The results showed that the highest amount of proline and potassium was in station 1, the highest amount of protein, phenolic compounds, soil salinity and magnesium content were obtained from station 3 and the highest amount of iron was observed in station 2. Moreover, station 3 had the highest level of antioxidant activity in all extracts, and all stations had the lowest level of antioxidant activity in hexane extract. Dichloromethane extracts in stations 2 and 3 had the highest level of antioxidant activity, while in station 1 the highest level of antioxidant activity was found in methanolic extract. Therefore, we concluded that with increasing soil salinity, the phenolic content and antioxidant activity of the populations of P. abrotanoides increase.