Extraction of lavender essential oil and its antioxidant actiivity

The flowers and leaves of Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia Mill) have been used as a herbal medicine for the treatment of heal burns and insect bites. Previous studies have shown that its exacts exhibited wide range of bioactivities such as analgesic, wound healing, antibacterial, antifungal, sedative and antidepressant effects. Lavender essential oil has attracted a great deal of interest for its potential uses in food, perfume and pharmaceutical industries. It has a soothing and calming effect on the nerves, relieving tension, depression, panic and nervous exhaustion in general and is effective to reduce anxiety in both clinical and preclinical studies. In this study, the details of the optimum extraction condition for lavender essential oil, its chemical constituents and antioxidant properties have been studied. It was found that the most abundant constituents of the lavender essential oil collected in Urumqi (Xiangjiang province, China) are linalool (2.1%) and linalyl acetate (3.0%), both of them have been proposed as topical palliatives of pain in animal models. The antioxidant activity indicated that the lavender essential oil can scavenge hydroxyl radicals.