Objectives: Thymus vulgaris species are well known as medicinal plants because of their
biological and pharmacological properties, however, to the best of our knowledge there are no
earlier reports yet available regarding the detailed chemical characterization and evaluation
of biological and antioxidant principles of essential oils from plants of Lamiaceae family,
native to Yemen.
Methods: The extraction of essential oils of leaves of Thymus vulgaris is obtained by hydrodistillation
and analyzed by gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC/MS)
for determining their chemical composition. Their antimicrobial activity were studied in vitro
on bacterial strains: Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis,
Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Mycobacterium smegmatis and fungal strains:
Candida albicans and Candida vaginalis.
Findings: The essential oil yield of the study was 0.76 g 100g-1. The major component was
thymol (51.34%), p-cymene (18.35%), other predominant components were caryophyllene
(4.26%), α-pinene (2.95%), β-myrcene (2.50%), thymyl methyl ether (2.16%), carvacrol
(2.03%), β-pinene (1.97%), α-cadinol (1.41%), 3-carene (1.10%), thymyl acetate (0.92%),
camphene (0.913%), germacrene D (0.78%), sabinen (0.76%), o-cymene (0.63%), linalool
(0.60%), terpineol (0.56%), α-terpinol (0.55%), 1,8-cineol (0.53%), farnesol (0.52%), 3-octanone
(0.47%), caryophyllene oxide (0.43%), and α-phellandrene (0.15%). The bacterial and
fungal strains tested were found to be sensitive to essential oil studied and showed a very
effective bactericidal and antifungal activity with minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC)
ranging from 75 to 1100 μg/mL and 80 and 97μg/mL, respectively.
Conclusion: These results represent an inexpensive source of natural antibacterial and antifungal
substances that exhibited potential for use in pathogenic systems.
Keywords: Essential oil composition, GC/MS, antimicrobial activities, Thymus vulgaris