Allelopathic activity of essential oil extracts from Artemisia herba-alba Asso. on seed and seedling germination of weed and wheat crops

Abstract The allelopathic potential of essential oil extracts from Artemisia herba-alba Asso. was assessed on seed germination of nine weeds and two wheat varieties. The samples were collected from El-Rasfa région (Sétif, Algeria). The essential oil was extracted using hydrodistillation of aerial part and characterized using gaz chromatography coupled with mass spectroscopy. The bioassays with organic solvent (ethanol) were tested using four different concentrations (0.2, 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 µl/ml of oil/ethanol) on seed and seedling growth of the nine weeds and two wheat varieties. The yield obtained is 1.19%, and 36 compound had been identified. The main components are: camphor (28.58%), cis-thujone (22.03%), eucalyptol (11.65%) and trans-thujone (7.03%). The results of bioassays show that essential oil extracts has a significant effect on seed germination and seedling growth of the major weed tested and two wheat varieties. In conclusion, this study shows that the essential oil tested has an interesting allelopathic potential.