chart of components of essential oils?

Soapmaking Forum

Help Support Soapmaking Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Apr 5, 2018
Messages
3,532
Reaction score
12,058
Location
Minnesota
I am looking for an article or chart that lists the components of essential oils, like which ones contain citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc. My Google search results in overly scientific chemical formulas and I'm looking for a more layperson's resource.
The reason I ask is that I'm trying to dupe a product, and instead of listing specific essential oils, it lists things like citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc.
 
Ohhhhhhh...."Tisserand and Robert's book Essential Oil Safety".....
doggytyping.gif
 
Oh, I realize now that I've re-read your post that maybe I've given you a too science-y, detailed resource. I really don't know of a table or article that neatly translates EOs into chemical families.
 
It's not a chart, but Hopewell Essential Oils has a pretty extensive list of oils. If you click on the individual oil, the listing for that oil with show the key constituents from the GC/MS analysis.

ETA: Just re-read your post and realized that you'd have to reverse engineer by looking at a lot of oils, so that site won't help much for that purpose. But it's still a nice EO resource, and they often quote from Tisserand's book.
 
In some respects you are probably better googling the chemical constituents and asking for the essential oils that have those main components as each oil can have hundreds of differing constituents. Unfortunately a lot of the “layman” books don’t really get into specifics. I looked up “Advanced aromatherapy” Kurt Schnaubelt for you and here goes

“Oxygen containing monoterpenes such as geraniol, linalol, nerol and citral are amongst the most widely distributed natural terpene compounds.”

High linalol oils: rosewood, coriander, petitgrain, neroli, clary sage, lavender.

Citral/citronellal oils are geranium, rose, lemongrass, may chang. Citronellol is in anything smelling “lemony”.

Limonene is in all citrus oils

Geraniol: palmarosa.

I’m sure I have another chemistry book somewhere at the bottom of a box, lol, if you would like further info, but you might be better trusting your nose and figuring out by smell. 😉
 
I am looking for an article or chart that lists the components of essential oils, like which ones contain citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc. My Google search results in overly scientific chemical formulas and I'm looking for a more layperson's resource.
The reason I ask is that I'm trying to dupe a product, and instead of listing specific essential oils, it lists things like citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc.
those things are individual oils that you can buy. they are generally naturally derived from various essential oils. i just made a dupe of a perfume for the fun of it and have been collecting the individual components and key notes so i can play more. It is an expensive quest! New Directions has some and saveonscents has a lot. look for "key note" in the SaveOnScents.com website. i don't know where to get geraniol. geraniol is found in palmarosa, roses, citronella, geranium, petitgrain, eucalyptus.
citral is found in lemon
linalool is found in lavender, ylang-ylang, bergamot, jasmine, geranium.
limonene is found in lemon or any citrus.
I found this info by doing an internet search for each of the ingredients. Then i used my own substitutions. not having limonene on hand i subbed with lemon essential oil. not having geraniol on hand i subbed with palmarosa and ruined my experiment and had to start over!
 
In all the perfumes i've found on line they always have a bullsh*t description of the fragrance (that makes you dream of moonlit walks on the beach with Johnny Depp) followed by the ingredients and the key notes. the key notes are usually mostly essential oils but also include manmade fragrance oils for which there is no essential oil. for example, there is no EO for Lilac or Violet or Lily of the Valley. The Ingredients list on the other hand shows that the perfume contains alcohol, fragrance oils (i.e., FO's & EO's), a few weird chemicals (usually UVA and UVB protectors). And then rest of the stuff in the ingredients list is other naturally derived fragrance constituents like 4 ingredients you listed. I think it's safe to assume that because "fragrance oils" are listed separately from Linalool, Geraniol, Limonene, Citral etc., that the Linalool stuff indicates ingredients separate and apart from essential oils that contain those things. You can buy those things separately.

Linalool is found in lavender, ylang-ylang, bergamot, jasmine, geranium among many others. but those fragrances aren't necessarily what you want your perfume to smell like. there's a huge difference between bergamot and jasmine! you just need to buy a bottle of linalool. ;-)

These individual fragrance components can be found on new directions.com and save on scents.com. the geraniol is hard to find. i found it on amazon though and one company selling it is consolidated chemical.
 
Last edited:
In some respects you are probably better googling the chemical constituents and asking for the essential oils that have those main components as each oil can have hundreds of differing constituents. Unfortunately a lot of the “layman” books don’t really get into specifics. I looked up “Advanced aromatherapy” Kurt Schnaubelt for you and here goes

“Oxygen containing monoterpenes such as geraniol, linalol, nerol and citral are amongst the most widely distributed natural terpene compounds.”

High linalol oils: rosewood, coriander, petitgrain, neroli, clary sage, lavender.

Citral/citronellal oils are geranium, rose, lemongrass, may chang. Citronellol is in anything smelling “lemony”.

Limonene is in all citrus oils

Geraniol: palmarosa.

I’m sure I have another chemistry book somewhere at the bottom of a box, lol, if you would like further info, but you might be better trusting your nose and figuring out by smell. 😉
This is driving me nuts. I had a scientific-y aromatherapy book years ago. (Like 15 years ago) It was purple and small (like 250 pages). I thought it was by Kurt Schnaubelt et al. I definitely could be wrong about the author, but when you said it, the name ringed a bell. But I do know that it was written by several people. It had a lot of the chemical constituents of plants and essential oils. I USED to have notes from that book that I was studying (on my own). I have moved several times since then, and for the life of me cannot find the book or my notes. I am sure they are long gone.

The book that I had didn't have recipes etc. It was all scientific. Do you think this is the book that I am talking about?

edit: it wasn't written by several people....It was Medical Aromatherapy by Kurt Schnaubelt. I just did a quick google/amazon search on Kurt Schnaubelt and found my book. In my cart now LOL
 
Last edited:
@Zing this book had charts etc and was full of info on chemical properties of EO from what I remember. I used to study this book (again, on my own). I was thrilled at the scientific approach. I have it ordered, so I can update you after I get it. Like I mentioned, it's been a while since I had it and studied it.
 
I am looking for an article or chart that lists the components of essential oils, like which ones contain citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc. My Google search results in overly scientific chemical formulas and I'm looking for a more layperson's resource.
The reason I ask is that I'm trying to dupe a product, and instead of listing specific essential oils, it lists things like citral, gerianol, limonene, linalool, etc.
Mr. Zing, I found something here: Directory of Essential Oils: Uses and Benefits Alphabetized by Botanical Name | AromaWeb
 
Back
Top