1) Institute of Petroleum Chemistry and Catalysis, Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Bashkortostan and Ufa Scientific Center, Russian Academy of Sciences, Ufa-450075, prospekt Oktyabrya, 141, tel/fax 7(3472) 31 27 50, e-mail: ink@anrb.ru; 2) Institute of Biology, Ufa Scientific Center, Russian Academy of Sciences, Ufa-450054, prospekt Oktyabrya, 69, tel/fax 7(3472) 35 62 47. Translated from Khimiya Prirodnykh Soedinenii, No. 4, pp. 287-289, July-August, 2001. Original article submitted June 20, 2001. 0009-3130/01/3704-0339$25.00 2001 Plenum Publishing Corporation © 339 Chemistry of Natural Compounds, Vol. 37, No. 4, 2001 IDENTIFICATION AND BIOLOGICAL ACTIVITY OF VOLATILE ORGANIC COMPOUNDS EMITTED BY PLANTS AND INSECTS. IV. COMPOSITION OF VAPOR ISOLATED FROM CERTAIN SPECIES OF Artemisia PLANTS L. M. Khalilov, E. A. Paramonov, A. Z. Khalilova, UDC 543.51:547.314 1 1 1 V. N. Odinokov, A. A. Muldashev, U. A. Baltaev, 1 2 1 and U. M. Dzhemilev 1 The components of fragrance from four wormwood species of the Artemisia L. genus were analyzed by GC-MS. The major and minor components of volatile essential oils typical of the studied plant species were determined. Key words: Artemisia L., volatile organic compounds, capillary gas chromatography, mass spectrometric detection, monoterpenes, sesquiterpenes. Volatile organic compounds that are emitted by plants are an important factor in interspecies interactions in ecosystems. Investigations of the composition of volatile plant emissions increase our understanding of insect behavior and the development of modern methods for regulating their population. They can also be used to reveal correlations of the essential oil composition of certain plant species and their morphological signs. Therefore, studies of extracts of essential oil from wormwood Artemisia glabella Kar. et Kir. are of interest. It has been shown that the major components of plants grown in Kazakhstan and Italy are identical whereas the minor components differed slightly [1]. These results indicate that the chemical compositions of the essential oils are stable even with a significant change of soil and climate. On the other hand, plants of the species A. glabella Kar. et Kir. and A. obtusiloba Ledeb. [1]; A. radicans, A. Kuprijanov, and A. frigida Willd [2]; A. balchanorum Krasch., A. leucodes Shrenk., A. rhodantha Rupr., and A. scoparia Waldst. et Kit. [3], and two species of the Pimpinella L. genus [4, 5] each have a characteristic composition of essential oil that correlates with their morphological signs. Not so much the composition of the extracted essential oils as the volatile compounds emitted by the plant define the plant—insect chemical communication. Therefore, we investigated the composition of the plant fragrances using capillary gas chromatography with mass spectrometric detection (GC-MS) to analyze the volatile compounds. We previously reported the composition of the native fragrance of two plant species, potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) [6] and common goutweed (Aegopodium podagraria L.) [7]. In the present article we report the chemical composition of the fragrance of four species of wormwood: bitter (Artemisia absinthium L.), common (A. vulgaris L.), santolino-leaved (A. santolinifolia Thurcz. ex Krasch.), and field (A. campestris L.), which are widely used in official and folk medicine [8, 9]. Table 1 lists results of the GC-MS analysis. Each of the chromatographic peaks was identified by retention index and MS properties. The retention index was compared with those given in the literature [10-12]. Coincidence within uncertainty limits was the first condition of identification. The second condition was correspondence of the MS of the analyzed compound and that given in an MS database [13].