New insights into phytogenics

From the scientific point of view there are always the same problems with such publications: 1) the exact composition is not mentioned (ingredients and percentage) 2) the definition of plants (crude drug or powder) / extracts / essential oils is either missing or unclear, sometimes (semi)synthetic nature-identical substances are used and declared as essential oils or extracts 3) quality data = phytochemical data of the plants/extracts/ess. oils are missing: at least the chemotype of the material and the percentage of the main compounds Due to that no clear relation between substance and effect can be drawn! Most of such publications are therefore nice scientifically decorated (veiled) advertisements. Prof. Chlodwig FRANZ Head of the Institute for Applied Botany and Pharmacognosy University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, Austria

Your comments hold true, although production will adopt to scientific trends with practical successes much faster than science can prove. These ingredient technology trends will lead to similar animal responses across product and geographical variances, convincing me there is not one single phytonutrient or blended ingredient product for all practical challenge and bio-burden variations at the animal production level. Dan L. McDermott DLM Mkting

I agree fully with Prof. Franz Chlodwig on his comments. Many companies these days claim their product to be phytogenic products, when they are actually not even derived from plants, but synthetically produced. The active components of essential oils can be produced in a nature-identical form with a chemical structure identical to those present in naturally-occurring raw materials and their extracts. To comply with food legislation, nature identical forms require a degree of purity of not less that 99.5[percent] (C. Ariza-Nieto et al., 2005). These purification procedures are expensive and likely to be non-viable for commercial purposes. So whether these procedures are carried out in a proper fashion by such companies, we do not know. True and natural herbal plant products such as essential oils of thyme and oregano normally contain phenolic compounds that can benefit animal production and health. However, certain phenolic compounds such as carvacrol from thyme and oregano can be synthetically produced, but the synthesis of phenols is usually carried out with the reaction of an appropriate phenol (p-cresol) with iso-PrOH in ethylene chloride solution, in the presence of anhydrous AlCl3. As a result, the final product contains significant quantities of all isomers or isopropyl p-cresols. The purification of this mixture by conventional methods for the isolation of pure carvacrol is not easy, nor is it economically feasible. The toxicity of the above reagents (especially p-cresols and AlCl3) is well-known. Besides, even the latest procedures for the synthesis of phenols do not avoid the use of toxic reagents such as compounds containing ferum, aluminium or ruthenium. Therefore, the use of synthetic methyl-(isopropyl) phenols, such as synthetic carvacrol for example, is considered unacceptable in products destined for human or animal consumption. Have they really been widely researched? Has adequate toxicity data been firmly established? Are they really the replacements for AGPs that we are seeking? The use of such so-called phytogenic products containing synthetic or nature-identical substances should be questioned, especially with regards to its safety and suitability for entry into the food chain.

Dr. I agree with your assessment that there are companies representing synthetics as natural EO. I was contacted by one company from Asia which listed its raw material for Oregano Oil as being Orthocresol, metacresol, and 2-chlorine propane. Would this be an example of what to watch out for?