Diversity of terpenes and n alkanes in Pine species chemotaxonomic implications

Title : Diversity of terpenes and n alkanes in Pine species chemotaxonomic implications

Abstract:

It is well known that the Pinus genus is the most numerous in the Pinaceae family (about 110 species) and divided into two subgenus: Strobus (with 5 needles per fascicle) and Pinus (with 2 needles per fascicle). In this study, the focus is on autochthonous, relict and endemic species: Bosnian pine, P. heldreichii and Macedonian pine, P. peuce, because there are disagreements of various authors in terms of taxonomy. In addition, the terpene composition of 10 autochthonous and allochthonous pine species from the territory of Serbia and Croatia was examined.

In most taxa (P. mugo, P. nigra ssp. nigra, P. nigra ssp. dalmatica, P. peuce, P. pinea, P. sylvestris, P. strobus and P. wallichiana) a-pinene is the most abundant terpene compound, while the following terpenes are dominant in other species: b-pinene (P. ponderosa), trans-caryophyllene (P. halepensis), germacrene D (P. heldreichii), and abietadiene (P. pinaster).

In 12 analyzed species the following n-alkanes dominate: C₂₃ (P. heldreichii), C₂₅ and C₂₉ (P. peuce), C₂₇ (P. nigra), C₂₉ (P. mugo), C₃₁ (P. sylvestris or C₃₅ (P. ponderosa), etc. As in most cases the subjects of examination are individual trees, the obtained results direct us to population study in order to discover other chemotypes which are common in pines.

This work was supported by Grant No 173029 of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia.

Biography:

Dr. Nikolić studied Faculty of Forestry at the Belgrade University, Serbia and graduated as MS in 1989. She then joined the research group of Prof. P.D.Marin at the Institute of Botanic and Botanical Garden “Jevremovac”, Faculty of Biology, University of Belgrade, Belgrade. She received her PhD degree in 2008 at the same institution. Working on the Institute of Forestry from 1990 to nowdays, she obtained the position of a Prinicipal Research Fellow. She has published more than 40 research articles in SCI journals.