title: Extraction, Chemical Composition, and Antifungal Activity of Essential Oil of Bitter Almond.
abstract: The essential oil from the powder residual of dried bitter almond, a novel and environmentally-friendly fungicide, was successfully extracted in a 0.7% yield by hydro-distillation under optimized conditions. The chemical composition of bitter almond essential oil (BAEO) was analyzed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Twenty-one different components representing 99.90% of the total essential oil were identified, of which benzaldehyde (62.52%), benzoic acid (14.80%), and hexadecane (3.97%) were the most abundant components. Furthermore, the in vitro and in vivo antifungal activities of BAEO against common plant pathogenic fungi were evaluated by the mycelium linear growth rate method and pot test, respectively. It was documented that 1 mg/mL of BAEO could variously inhibit all tested pathogenic fungi with the inhibition rates of 44.8%~100%. Among the tested 19 strains of fungi, the median effective concentration (EC50) values of BAEO against Alternaria brassicae and Alternaria solani were only 50.2 and 103.2 μg/mL, respectively, which were higher than those of other fungi. The in vivo antifungal activity of BAEO against Gloeosporium orbiculare was much higher than Blumeria graminis. The protective efficacy for the former was up to 98.07% at 10 mg/mL and the treatment efficacy was 93.41% at 12 mg/mL. The above results indicated that BAEO has the great potential to be developed as a botanical and agricultural fungicide.
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. genghuiling@nwsuaf.edu.cn.|Key Laboratory of Environment and Ecology in Western China of Ministry of Education, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. genghuiling@nwsuaf.edu.cn.
authors: Huiling
authors: H
authors: Geng
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. yuxinchi121@163.com.
authors: Xinchi
authors: X
authors: Yu
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. ailin_lu@163.com.
authors: Ailin
authors: A
authors: Lu
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. 18700809193@163.com.
authors: Haoqiang
authors: H
authors: Cao
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. zhoubohang@nwsuaf.edu.cn.
authors: Bohang
authors: B
authors: Zhou
authors: College of Science, Northwest A & F University, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. zhoulechem@nwsuaf.edu.cn.
authors: Le
authors: L
authors: Zhou
authors: Key Laboratory of Environment and Ecology in Western China of Ministry of Education, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China. zhaozh@nwsuaf.edu.cn.
authors: Zhong
authors: Z
authors: Zhao
mesh_terms: D000935:Antifungal Agents / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology*; D005658:Fungi / Q000187:drug effects; D009822:Oils, Volatile / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology*; D010938:Plant Oils / Q000737:chemistry / Q000494:pharmacology*; D000068219:Prunus armeniaca / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D000935:Antifungal Agents; D009822:Oils, Volatile; D010938:Plant Oils
keywords: GC-MS; antifungal activity; bitter almond; chemical composition; essential oil