Essential Oil Content and Composition of Almescla Resin (Protium spruceanum (Benth.) Engl., Burseraceae

Abstract

In recent decades, there has been a significant increase in interest in natural therapies. In this way, plants with therapeutic properties constitute an important source of biologically active compounds. The species Protium spruceanum (Benth.) Engl., popularly known as Almescla is widely used in folk medicine, with a wide geographical distribution, often found in gallery forests and palm swamps (veredas), thus easily accessible. The objective of this work was to evaluate the oil yield of the leaves and stem, as well as the chemical composition of Almescla resin collected in a palm swamp in the north-central region of Minas Gerais. After drying, the botanical samples were triturated until a fine powder was obtained and the particle size of the leaf sample standardized through sieves. The test was carried out in triplicate, the oil being obtained from the hot extraction method in Soxhlet with solvent Hexane P.A. The resin was subjected to chromatographic analysis and infrared spectroscopy, by the preparation of KBr pellets (1% m/m). For the leaf sample, an average yield of 3.33% was obtained and for the stem, an average yield of 1.40%. The resin had the major chemical compound α-phellandrene (58.18-71.25%). It is concluded that, Almescla has a great oil yield, and the chemical analysis showed that the species has a great medicinal potential to be exploited.