Composition, Antifungal and Antiproliferative Activities of the Hydrodistilled Oils from Leaves and Flowering Parts of the Kurdish Medicinal Plant Pterocephalus nestorianus Nab.

This paper reports the first study of the chemical composition, and antifungal and
antiproliferative properties of the volatile extracts obtained by hydrodistillation of the
flowering parts and leaves of the Kurdish traditional plant P. nestorianus Nab.,
collected in the wild. A total of fifty-five constituents, 43 of the flowering parts' oil (PFO)
and 46 of the leaves' oil (PLO), were identified by GC/MS, constituting 99.68% and
99.04% of the two oils, respectively (Table 1). The oils were obtained in 0.15% and
0.10% yields (w/w), respectively, on air-dried vegetable material. The prevalent
constituents of the PFO were α-terpineol (2.41%), α-linalool (6.42%), 6,10,14-
trimethylpentadecan-2-one (2.59%), myristic acid (24.65 %), and lauric acid (50.44%),
while the major components of PLO were (E)-hex-2-enal (2.26%), (E)-hex-2-en-1-ol
(2.04), myristic acid (34.03%), and lauric acid (50.35%). The two oils showed
significant inhibitory and fungicidal activities against the medically important fungi
Candida albicans, C. tropicalis, Microsporum canis, and Trichophyton mentagrophytes,
with MIC ranging from 0.7 to 3.3 mg/ml and MFC varying from 1.4 to 6.6 mg/ml. The
antiproliferative activity of the two oils was assayed against one normal and six human
tumor cell lines. Both oils showed selective cytotoxic activity, with IC50 values ranging
from 1.4 to 3.3 g/ml.