Ruta Essential Oils: Composition and Bioactivities
molecules Review Ruta Essential Oils: Composition and Bioactivities Lutfun Nahar 1,* , Hesham R. El-Seedi 2, Shaden A. M. Khalifa 3, Majid Mohammadhosseini 4 and Satyajit D. Sarker 5,* 1 Laboratory of Growth Regulators, Institute of Experimental Botany ASCR & Palacký University, Šlechtitel ˚u27, 78371 Olomouc, Czech Republic 2 Biomedical Centre (BMC), Pharmacognosy Group, Department of Pharmaceutical Biosciences, Uppsala University, Box 591, SE-751 24 Uppsala, Sweden; hesham.el-seedi@farmbio.uu.se 3 Department of Molecular Biosciences, The Wenner-Gren Institute, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden; shaden.khalifa.2014@gmail.com 4 Department of Chemistry, College of Basic Sciences, Shahrood Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrood, Iran; majidmohammadhosseini@yahoo.com 5 Centre for Natural Products Discovery (CNPD), School of Pharmacy and Biomolecular Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, James Parsons Building, Byrom Street, Liverpool L3 3AF, UK * Correspondence: drnahar@live.co.uk (L.N.); S.Sarker@ljmu.ac.uk (S.D.S.); Tel.: +44-(0)-1512312096 (S.D.S.) Abstract: Ruta L. is a typical genus of the citrus family, Rutaceae Juss. and comprises ca. 40 different species, mainly distributed in the Mediterranean region. Ruta species have long been used in traditional medicines as an abortifacient and emmenagogue and for the treatment of lung diseases and microbial infections. The genus Ruta is rich in essential oils, which predominantly contain aliphatic ketones, e.g., 2-undecanone and 2-nonanone, but lack any significant amounts of terpenes. Three Ruta species, Ruta chalepensis L., Ruta graveolens L., and Ruta montana L., have been extensively studied for the composition of their essential oils and several bioactivities, revealing their potential medicinal and agrochemical applications.
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