What is estragole used for?

What is estragole used for?

Estragole is also used as a flavoring agent in pharmaceutical, cosmetic, and food industries (4,5) and as an antimicrobial for food preservation (6). Estragole has many biological effects, including antioxidant and antimicrobial activities (7,8).

Where is estragole found?

Estragole occurs naturally in many culinary herbs, including anise, star anise, basil, bay, tarragon, fennel, and marjoram.

What is estragole and anethole?

Estragole and anethole are secondary metabolites occurring in a variety of commonly used herbs like fennel, basil, and anise.

What foods contain estragole?

Estragole occurs naturally in a variety of foods including tarragon (60-75% of essential oil), sweet basil (20-43% of essential oil), sweet fennel (5-20% of essential oil), anis vert (1% of essential oil), and anis star (5-6% of essential oil) (Council of Europe, 2000).

Is estragole a carcinogen?

Estragole is a natural constituent of basil oil. Several studies with oral, intraperitoneal or subcutaneous administration to CD-1 and B6C3F1 mice have shown that estragole is carcinogenic. The 1-hydroxy metabolites are stronger hepatocarcinogens than the parent compound.

Is estragole a phenol?

Ethers (Phenolic) or Phenylpropanoids Estragole is sometimes called methyl-chavicol (Tisserand & Young 2013). Ethers are not widely distributed but are found in some common essential oils, for example: anise, basil, cinnamon leaf, and fennel. Ethers are less aggressive on the skin than phenols.

What functional groups are in estragole?

Estragole (p-allylanisole, methyl chavicol) is a phenylpropene, a natural organic compound. Its chemical structure consists of a benzene ring substituted with a methoxy group and an allyl group.

What is the melting point of estragole?

0
Technical Specification

Product Estragole
Physical State Colourless to pale straw oily liquid
Specific Gravity 0.9700
Refractive Index 1.5210
Melting Point 0

Is estragole toxic?

1 Toxicity studies. Estragole is a natural constituent of basil oil. Several studies with oral, intraperitoneal or subcutaneous administration to CD-1 and B6C3F1 mice have shown that estragole is carcinogenic. The 1-hydroxy metabolites are stronger hepatocarcinogens than the parent compound.

Is anethole carcinogenic?

However, we report here that synthetic trans-anethole oxide prepared from trans-anethole and dimethyldioxirane is not only mutagenic for Salmonella tester strains but is also carcinogenic in the induction of hepatomas in B6C3F1 mice and skin papillomas in CD-1 mice.

Is estragole carcinogenic?

What essential oils contain Anethole?

What essential oils contain a high percentages of trans-anethole?

  • Anise (Pimpinella anisum)
  • Anise (star), (Illicium verum)
  • Fennel (bitter), (Foeniculum vulgare) subsp. Capillaceum.
  • Fennel (sweet), (Foeniculum vulgare dulce)
  • Myrtle (aniseed), (Backhousia anisata)

Is fennel essential oil carcinogenic?

Fennel was also valued as a magic herb: in the Middle Ages it was draped over doorways on Midsummer’s Eve to protect the household from evil spirits. Recently because of estragole carcinogenicity, fennel has been charged to be dangerous for humans especially if used as decoction for babies.

Is a diffuser carcinogenic?

Some essential oils may contain substances that can cause cancer. These include estragole, asarone, safrole, and methyl eugenol. Some essential oils that contain these carcinogens are considered carcinogenic, but others are not.

What is Anethole good for?

Anethole has been reported to exert local anesthetic (31), sedative (32), oestrogenic, anti-genotoxic and anti-tumor activities (33) with no or little toxic side effect. As mentioned above, herbal medicine principally has been used as traditional treatments for many human diseases, including infectious diseases (e.g.

Is Lavender a carcinogen?

The main health risk associated with smoking lavender is exposure to smoke and other potential carcinogens.

Is basil oil toxic?

The active principles of basil oil were determined to be citral, alpha-terpineol, and linalool. Citral (24 h LC50, 1.13 microg/cm2) and menthol (1.69 microg/cm2) were the most toxic compounds, followed by methyl eugenol (5.78 microg/cm2).

Is anethole toxic?

In large quantities, anethole is slightly toxic and may act as an irritant.

What is anethole good for?