Simultaneous ultrasound-assisted hydrodistillation of essential oil from aerial parts of the Satureja khuzistanica Jamzad and its antibacterial activity

Ultrasonic assisted extraction (UAE) is a robust and efficient method as a desirable alternative to conventional strategies for extracting active ingredients from different parts of plants. Coupling this technique with hydrodistillation is an effective method for producing essential oil from plant material.

In this study, we successfully combined ultrasonic technology with hydrodistillation (HD) and optimized the system to reduce the time of the isolation and increase the yield of the essential oil obtained from Stureja khuzistanica Jamzad (SK).

In the next step, isolation time, yield, and quality of essential oils obtained by conventional and ultrasonic-assisted methods were compared. Ethyl acetate (EA) was used to recover the remaining essential oil in the distillate.

All oils and distillates were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively via the GC-FID and GC-MS techniques. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of SK essential oil against Escherichia coli (0.5 mg/ml to 8.0 mg/ml) and Staphylococcus aureus (0.25 mg/ml to 8.0 mg/ml) were calculated.

Our results show that while the obtained essential oils chemical profile and biological properties are comparable, this method can enhance essential oil isolation yield efficiency by up to 40 %.