4. CONCLUSIONS
The extracted essential oils from three different Thymus plants
cultivated in Portugal have shown a great diversity of chemical
compounds within their compositions. The hydrodistilled
essential oil from T. fontqueri was chemically evaluated with
scientific grounds for the first time since the taxonomic study
of Molero and Rovira. Furthermore, T. x citriodorus and
T. fontqueri essential oils were obtained by supercritical CO2
extraction, and their chemical compositions were analyzed for
the first time. T. zygis and T. fontqueri have shown to be typical
phenolic oils, having thymol and carvacrol as main components,
respectively. Lemon-scented species of T. x citriodorus was
richest in geraniol and citral as expected. Extractions performed
by hydrodistillation resulted in higher yields when comparing