STANDARDIZATION OF ESSENTIAL OIL OF NEPETA СATARIA L. (CATNIP OIL)
The purpose of the article was to study and develop approaches to the standardization of the essential oil obtained from the herb of the catnip (Nepeta cataria L.) which was achieved by solving the following tasks: obtaining the essential oil, choosing the parameters of its standardization and normalizing them, studying the component composition and choosing the marker compound followed by quantitative assessment. GC-MS method was used to determine the composition and the major components of the essential oil. The dominant component is nepetalacton (29.74%). Quality indicators (general appearance, transparence, colour, odour, solubility, presence of alcohol, water, foreign esters, fatty oils and resinified essential oil, loss on drying, relative density, optical rotation, refractive index, acid value), which will be further used in the development of regulatory documents (draft monograph for the Pharmacopoeia) on the catnip essential oil have been determined and normalized. The gas chromatography method for quantitative determination of nepetalactone of catnip oil has been developed and validated. The content of nepetalacton in catnip oil, determined by the GC method, was 42.37%. Statistical processing of the obtained results showed that all the validation parameters are within acceptance criteria, therefore, the recommended method can be used in the analytical laboratory to assess the quality of catnip oil.