Neuropharmacological activities of phytoncide released fromCryptomeria japonica

  • Cheng, Wei-Wen
  • Lin, Chien-Tsong
  • Chu, Fang-Hua
  • Chang, Shang-Tzen
  • Wang, Sheng-Yang

  • 1Department of Forestry/Core Lab of Plant Metabolomics in Biotechnology Development Center, National Chung-Hsing University, No. 250 Kuo-Kuang Road, Taichung, 402 Taiwan

    2School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, National Taiwan University, Taipei, 106 Taiwan

e-mail: [email protected]

Received: 2 April 2008/Accepted: 4 August 2008/Published online: 16 October 2008

Journal of Wood Science 55(1):p 27-31, February 2009. | DOI: 10.1007/s10086-008-0984-2

Abstract

Forest-air bathing and walking (shinrin-yoku) is beneficial to human heath. In this study the phytoncide (volatile compounds) released from Cryptomeria japonica plantation forest was characterized by using solid-phase microextraction (SPME) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The main volatile compounds were α-pinene (19.35%), β-myrcene (16.98%), d-limonene (15.21%), and γ-muurolene (7.42%). Furthermore, the neuropharmacological activity of the essential oils from leaves of C. japonica (ECJ) was evaluated by several animal behavior tests. ECJ could prolong the sleeping phase of ICR (imprinting control region) mice in the pentobarbital-induced sleeping time model. Furthermore, both EJC and one of its monoterpenes, d-limonene, possessed potent anxiolytic and analgesic activities based on the results obtained from elevated plus maze and writhing tests. The volatile compounds released from C. japonica provide relaxing and stress-relieving effects on mice, and further study on the effect of phytoncide on humans is worthwhile.

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