Chemical composition and cytotoxic activities of essential oils of leaves and berries of Juniperus phoenicea L grown in Egypt

Hydrodistillation of berries and leaves of Juniperus phoenicea grown in Sinai yielded volatile oils in the yield of 0.36 and 1.96%, respectively. Using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry technique, fifty eight compounds were identified in berry oil representing 99.2% of the oil composition. Alpha-pinene was the major compound in berry oil (39.30%) followed by sabinene (24.29%). Berry oil composed mainly of monoterpenoids which amounted to 90.58%, of which 72.85% was monoterpene hydrocarbons. The sesquiterpenoids accounted for about 8% of the total oil composition. Leaf oil was composed of about 66 compounds representing 99.16% of the total composition of the oil. Alpha-pinene was the major constituent of leaf oil at concentration of 38.22%, followed by alpha-cedrol (31.23%). The monoterpene hydrocarbon was the predominant chemical group (41.29%) followed by the oxygenated sesquiterpenes (32.21%). Both oils showed very high cytotoxic activities against all cell line tested. Both oils showed equal activities against brain (0.6 microgram/mL) and cervix (5.0 microgram/mL) human cell lines, while berry oil was slightly more active than leaf oil against lung (0.6 and 0.7 microgram/mL, respectively), liver (0.7 and 0.9 microgram/mL, respectively) and breast human cell lines (0.8 and 1.0 microgram/mL, respectively).

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