Extraction of Essential Oils from Afghanistan Medicinal Plants Using Microwave and Conventional Methods

Afghanistan has many kinds of volatile-oil-rich and not-fully-utilized flora. This article represents a review on Afghanistan medicinal plants contain essential oils. Lamiaceae, Asteraceae and Apiaceae are the most important botanical families which are widely found and used as traditional medicines, food and spices in Afghanistan. Over 215 plants which are used in traditional therapy in Afghanistan, 93 plants contain essential oils. Twenty-two plants contain essential oils applied to microwave extraction techniques and forty-nine plants contain essential oils applied to conventional extraction techniques. Totally 41 extracted species belong to above mentioned botanical families that could be found in Afghanistan too. But still there are some species of these families which are endemic in Afghanistan and not studied yet.