Week 1: Intro + Background

Hello everyone, I’ll be going over my project background and some literature research I’ve done for my project.

Monoterpenes are a class of compounds with the chemical formula C10H16 that play an important role in pharmaceutical, cosmetic, agricultural, and food industries. One monoterpene, limonene, is monocyclic monoterpene found in citrus and orange peel oil. It has two isomers: R- and S- limonene, and the two are found in different plants and have different odors. R-limonene is found in citrus and has a citrus smell, whereas S-limonene is found in caraway and dill and has a piney smell.

For my research, I will be focusing on the R-limonene found in oranges and the S-limonene found in mints. I’ll be testing how mint enzymes react with R-limonene and other compounds from oranges. Enzymes in mint react with S-limonene; however, many monoterpenes found in orange have similar chemical structure to S-limonene and may react with the enzymes found in mint. Since limonene and many other volatile compounds play an important role in the healthcare and agriculture industry, the novel compounds that are synthesized may be of significance to both fields.

This week I made buffers which I’ll be using to extract enzymes from the mint plants. I’ve started asking around for people with mint since I’ll be needing lots of mint leaves (at least 20g+) for my project, so if anyone has lots of mint sitting in their backyard please let me know!