Essential oil composition of Aristolochia chilensis a host plant of Battus polydamas

Abstract

In this communication we report the essential oil composition of Aristolochia chilensis Bridges ex Lindl. fresh leaves. This species is one of the larval food-plants of Battus polydamas Boisd., the only butterfly of the family Papihonidae (Lepidoptera) occurring in Chile. In order to determine possible chemical similarities among several of its host species distributed throughout the continent, we compared these results with data obtained from literature on the composition of other representative Aristolochia species occurring in Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil. Instead of the expected, it was found that the essential oil of each species considered in this work exhibits a particular characteristic profile. © 2008 Sociedad Chilena de Química.