Abstract
The genus Ziziphora L. (Lamiaceae) comprises about 30 species wide spread over Asia, Africa and Europe. The plant Ziziphora bungeana Jus. is distributed mainly in Kazakhstan and Central Asia. It is widely used in Kazakh folk medicine for the treatment of hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases. The composition of volatile oil prepared by hydrodistillation from the areal parts of Z. bungeana , was determined by GC/MS analysis. The major components were identified as: pulegone (58.30%), isomenthone (13.49%), menthone (6.71%), α-limonene (5.79%), isopulegone (5.01%), isomenthol (2.63%), β-pinene (1.44%) and α-pinene (1.04%). Bioassay-guided fractionation of the supercritical fluid extract of Z. bungeana lead to the isolation of oleic acid, betulin, β-sitosterol, glyceryl 1 , 3-dilinoleate and a triterpene (I). The chemical structure of I was determined on the basis of its 1D, 2D NMR and HRMS spectral data to be 3β-acetoxyolean-11-en-28,13β-olide. This is the first report for the isolation of compound I from natural source. Fig. 1