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Piper longum L. (long pepper) is an economically and industrially important medicinal plant. However, the characterization of its volatiles has only been analyzed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). In the present study, precise characterization of P. longum fruit volatiles has been performed for the first time through advanced two-dimensional gas chromatography-time-of-flight spectrometry (GC×GC-TOFMS). A total of 146 constituents accounting for 93.79% were identified, of which 30 were reported for the first time. All these constituents were classified into alcohols (4.5%), alkanes (8.9%), alkenes (6.71%), esters (6.15%), ketones (0.58%), monoterpene hydrocarbons (1.64%), oxygenated monoterpenes (2.24%), sesquiterpene hydrocarbons (49.61%), oxygenated sesquiterpenes (13.03%), phenylpropanoid (0.23%), and diterpenes (0.2%). Among all the classes, sesquiterpene hydrocarbons were abundant, with germacrene-D (2.87% ± 0.01%) as the major one, followed by 8-heptadecene (2.69% ± 0.03%), β-caryophyllene (2.43% ± 0.03%), n-heptadecane (2.4% ± 0.04%), n-pentadecane (2.11% ± 0.05%), and so forth. Further, 20 constituents were observed to be coeluted and separated precisely in the two-dimensional column. The investigation provides an extensive metabolite profiling of P. longum fruit volatiles, which could be helpful to improve its therapeutic potential.
Dash et al. (Tue,) studied this question.