ABSTRACT
Ornithogalum procerum Stapf. [Family: Liliaceae] is an Iranian medicinal plant found mainly in the east Azarbaiijan province of Iran. As part of our on-going phytochemical and bioactivity studies on medicinal plants from Iranian flora, various extracts and essential oils of this plant were analysed by GC-MS. The hydrodistillation of the ground aerial parts of O. procerum, Soxhlet-extraction of the dried and ground bulbs, and the hydrolysis of the methanol extract of the bulbs yielded, the essential oils, n-hexane extrcat and the hydrolysed methanolic extract respectively, which were analysed by the GC-MS. A total of 23 compounds were identified from the essential oils of the the aerial parts. The identified compounds represented 70.27% of the total essential oils. The main components of the aerial parts were phenylacetaldehyde [7.57%], hexahydrofarnesyl acetone [8.13%], docosan [5.52%] and 5-methyl octadecane [4.63%]. From the n-hexan extract of the bulbs, seven hydrocarbons representing 99.39% of the total extract, were identified. Finally, from the hydrolyzed methanolic extract of the bulbs, four polysterol-type compounds accounting for 59.81% of the extract, were detected. The GC-MS analyses reavealed that the essential oils are mainly composed of oxygenated hydrocarbons, the n-hexane extract contains predominatly hydrocarbons, and the hydrolyzed methanolic extract comprises polysterol-type compounds