Perfumes and Essential Oils

David S. Seigler
Department of Plant Biology
University of Illinois
Urbana, Illinois 61801 USA

seigler@life.illinois.edu
http://www.life.illinois.edu/seigler

 PerfumesandEssentialOils:Outline

Importance
Historical
Economic
Esthetic
Manufacture

Types of perfumery ingredients
+ Odorants
+ Concretes
+ Absolutes
+ Tinctures
+ Distilled oils
+ Expressed Oils
+ Fixatives
+ Extenders

o Methods of isolation
+ Enfleurage:
Pomade, soap
Important oils prepared by
enfleurage: Rose, jasmine,
violet
+ Steam Distillation
+ Fractional Distillation:
Important oils prepared by
distillation: Ylang-ylang,
patchouly, oil neroli,
lavender, lemon grass oil,
citronella oil

 + Expression
Important oils by expression:
lemon, lime
+ Extraction
Important oils by
extraction
Question: Why is one method preferred
over another?
1. Cost
2. Quality of product
3. Availability of product

 Commercial essential oils:
Uses
Properties
Sources

 Reading

CHAPTER 8 IN THE TEXT

 The origin of perfumes
It is difficult to know when
people first started to use
perfumes. The Egyptians had
become skilled perfumers over
5000 years ago.
The Hebrews learned from them.
Recipes for perfumes and incenses
are found in the Torah or Jewish
law.
Perfumes also showed up very
early in the Orient. The Japanese
and Chinese both developed
perfumes and incenses as well.

 Aperfumemarketin
Sudan
CourtesyDr.DorotheaBedigian

 Perfumery reached its pinnacle
during the Roman Empire. They
perfumed everything. After the fall
of the Roman Empire, perfumery in
Europe just about disappeared.
The Arabs maintained these skills
and improved them.
At the time of the Crusades, the
crusaders not only discovered
spices, but also perfumes.
The French developed the art of
perfumery even more.

 There is a lot of folklore
associated with perfumery.
Many of the recipes for the
best perfumes are guarded
trade secrets.
In the last few years, all
major perfumers have a staff
of organic chemists and
perfume compounding is no
longer an art, but a science.

 How perfumes are made
All perfumes originally came from
plants (or animals). The material
could be used directly (as
frankincense and myrrh) or
extracted in some way. The
challenge was (and is) how to
remove the essential oils from the
plant material without changing
the composition.
Other materials known as fixatives
retard and modify the evaporation
of volatile essential oils.

 Odorants give the perfumes
characteristic odor.
There are five types:
concretes
absolutes
distilled and fractionally distilled
oils
expressed oils
tinctures.


http://www.fragonard.com/@en-us/Default.asp
 Concretes

Many factors determine which

method is used. Among these are
cost, quality of essence, and use
of the product.
Concretes are the purest of the
natural odorants. They are
obtained by using a hydrocarbon
solvent to dissolve the essential
oils out of the plant.
The solvent is then removed under
vacuum by mild heating.

 Absolutes

Absolutes are extracted from the non-

volatile materials with alcohol.
The alcohol is removed under vacuum
The alcohol is recovered and used in
colognes and lotions.

 Enfleurage

Enfleurage is a special method for

making concretes and absolutes. The
petals are pressed onto a coating of
pure lard and changed often.
After several days, the lard has
dissolved the released essential oils.
The essential oils are then removed
from the lard with alcohol.
The residual lard is pomade.
After extraction, the lard is used to
make soaps etc.

Trayoflardwithjasmineflowersusedforenfleurage

 Pomadefromenfleurage

 It is possible to make exceedingly
fine fragrances in this way, but it
is also very expensive.
This process today is seldom
carried out in France, but more
commonly in the Balkans and the
Near East where labor is much
cheaper.
Grasse in Provence used to be the
center for this industry.

 Grasse,Provence,France

 Rose oil or attar of roses (also
otto). The best quality oils
(absolutes) sell for as much as
$10,000 per kilogram.
From Rosa damascena (or R. alba and
R. centifolia) in the late bud stage.
These are small shrubs with not too
showy flowers. Done from April to
July. One g from about 2000 g of
flowers.

 The oil is about 40-65% citronellol
but many minor components that are
essential for good rose quality.
In fact, some are quite important
at less than 0.1% of the
citronellol content.
Rose oils are usually extended
before marketing.

 Rosadamascena,
Rosaceae

 Rosepetals

NationalGeographic
 Jasmine (Jasminum grandiflorum,
Oleaceae)
Jasmine (Jasminum grandiflorum,
Oleaceae) is also grown in southern
France. From July to October.
5000 flowers makes about 1 lb of
flowers.
More than 300 lbs. of flowers are
required to make 1 lb. of oil.
The flowers are picked at daybreak
for best odor.
Today this oil is mostly obtained by
solvent extraction because of price.

Jasmine,Jasminumofficionale,Oleaceae

 Violet (Viola odorata, Violaceae)

Violet (Viola odorata, Violaceae) is

also from Grasse, Toulouse and from the
Taggia valley in Italy. Grown under
shaded conditions. January to April.
The flowers are picked at night or
early morning. 1000 lbs. of flowers
gives 1 lb. of oil.


Violet,Violaodorata,Violaceae CourtesyDr.AnitaBrinker
 Codistillationwithwater

Steam distillation (or codistillation

with water) is another gentle and
widely used process.
Much less expensive than enfleurage.
The oils are insoluble and when the
steam-oil mixture is condensed, the
oil can be removed. The most volatile
compounds come over first and some
fractionation is observed.

 Fractional distillation

Fractional distillation (without

water) separates the components by
boiling point (the explanation in
the text is not quite accurate).
Both steam distillation and
fractional distillation of essential
oils are much cheaper than
enfleurage, but different mixtures
of compounds are obtained and heat
causes some rearrangements and
changes in structure of the
essential oil components.

 Oil ylang-ylang
(Cananga odorata,
Annonaceae) is
widely used in
perfumes and is
relatively
expensive.

Steamdistillingylangylang,Canangaodorata
NationalGeographic

EssentialoilfromAcaciadealbata

 Patchouly oil (Pogostemon cablin,
Lamiaceae or Labiatae)

Patchouly oil was brought from

India to England by the British
East India Company.
This perfume became the mark of
dissolute women. Used in heavy
perfumes and soaps as a fixative.
Isolated by distillation. The
foliage is 2-3% oil.
Now produced in the Seychelles and
Indonesia.

 Oil neroli (from orange
blossoms) (Citrus aurantium)
is also isolated by
distillation.
From Italy, Spain, Portugal,
Provence. May.

 Lavender
(Lavendula
officinalis or
L. vera)
(Lamiaceae or
Labiatae) also
important from
Provence.

 Lemon grass oil (Cymbopogon
citratus, Poaceae or Gramineae)
is widely used as a substitute
for expressed lemon oil.
It is used in soaps, perfumes,
food products, and in mosquito
repellents.

 Citronella oil
(Cymbopogon
nardus),
Poaceae, used to
be widely used
as a mosquito
repellent in the
South.

BentleyandTrimen,MedicinalPlants

 Expressed oils

Expression is useful for things

like lemon and lime peels.
For most plants, the oils are
contaminated with too many other
undesirable compounds to make the
method practical.
The compounds are not changed by
heat, however, and in some
instances are better quality than
steam distilled or fractionally
distilled.

Citrusfruits.

CarolinaBiologicalSupplyCo.
 Tinctures

Tinctures (or alcoholic

extracts) are widely used.
They are cheap, but they are
sometimes contaminated with
other undesirable products as
well.

 Today, many perfumes are purely
synthetic, but the best quality
perfumes still come from plants.
In laundry soap, this is probably not
too critical. For good quality
perfume, it's obviously more a
concern.
In some cases, the plants are so
inexpensive, that synthetic products
are not competitive.
Not only the isolation of the
essential oil, but also the
compounding of the perfume is complex
and critical.

 Types of perfumery ingredients

Odorants
Concretes
Absolutes
Tinctures
Fixatives
Extenders

 The balance of essential
oils, fixatives, and
extenders is all involved.
This stage is often highly
empirical.
Most perfume companies have a
"nose" to evaluate the
products.

 Anose

NationalGeographic
 Orrisroot,Irisflorentina,Iridaceae

NationalGeographic
 Orrisroot NationalGeographic

 Extenders

Someessentialoils,suchasrose,jasmine,orneroli
areveryexpensive.
Whenusedinablenditisimportantthattheir
fragranceisnotwasted.
Naturalextendersaretheoilsusedwiththemost
expensiveoilstomaketheblendsaffordablewhile
atthesametimerespectingthenotesofthe
preciousoils.

 Commercial essential oils

The major components of essential

oils are terpenes, phenylpropanoids,
and metabolized fatty acids. They
are found in all different parts of
plants and the essential oils from
the different plant parts differ in
composition. They often differ with
stage of development as well.

 Analembicorstill

 Essential oils are used in:
soaps, deodorants, toilet
preparations, flavoring food and
beverages, tobacco, antiseptics,
solvents (e.g., turpentine),
insecticides and insect
repellents (as oil of
citronella), and plasticizers in
plastics.

Camphortree,Cinnamomumcamphora,
Lauraceae
Eucalyptus,Eucalyptusglobulis,Myrtaceae

Sassafras,Sassafrasalbidum,Lauraceae

 Juniperorcedar,
Juniperusvirginiana,
Cupressaceae