DOI: https://doi.org/10.55373/mjchem.v26i2.86

Keywords: Essential Oil; Aquilaria genus; Hydrodistillation; GCMS analysis; quality indicators

Abstract

Agarwood is one of the valuable natural products important for fragrance industry and medicinal applications. The material is valuable and has a long-standing history of applications in perfumery, incense making, traditional medicine, and for spiritual rituals. The quality of agarwood is classically evaluated based on physical characteristics. There is lack of a standardized quality grading system to objectively assess the quality of agarwood. This poses significant challenges to verify the authenticity, quality, and consistency of this valuable natural product. This study extracted essential oils from two samples of agarwood (SS and KPY) for analysis using Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry (GCMS). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and variable selection approaches were applied to examine the chemical profiles of the agarwood samples. Results showed that the chemical profiles of the two groups of agarwood were differentiable. The agarwood indicators were identified based on the criteria that a compound is significant, consistently found in replicates of extracts, and supported by literatures. A total of 11 compounds are recommended as the quality indicators of agarwood: allo-khusiol, chlorodifluoroacetate-isolongifolol, agarospirol, α-kessyl acetate, β-dihydroagarofuran, selina-3,11-dien-9-ol, α-epi-7-epi-5-eudesmol, α-agarofuran, 4-phenyl-2-butanone, alloaromadendrene, and eremophila-1(10). The findings of this study provide a set of criteria for objective evaluation of essential oil from agarwood.