Cedar oil and its characteristics

Cedarwood oil also known as cedarwood oil, is an essential oil extracted from various types of coniferous trees, most belonging to the pine or cypress plant family.It is produced from leaves and sometimes wood, roots and stumps left after felling trees.It has many uses in art, industry, and perfumery, and while the properties of oils from different species may vary, all possess some degree of insecticidal action.

Origin and characteristics

Although called cedar or cedar wood oil, the most important oil is extracted from the wood of many different juniper and cypress trees (Cedpressaceae), not true cedar (Pinaceae).Similar oils are distilled, pressed, or chemically extracted in small quantities from the wood, roots, and leaves of plants of the genera Cypress, Cypress, Formosanum, and Calocedrus.The ancients, especially the Sumerians and Egyptians, derived their cedar oil from Lebanese cedar, a true cedar native to the mountains of the north and west of the Middle East.The once lush Lebanese cedar forests of ancient times have been almost completely eradicated, and today no commercial oil extraction is based on this species.One of the elements found in many cedar trees is cedrol.The content of cedrol in a cedar will affect its insecticidal effect on insects.As part of ancient Egyptian burial practices, cedar oil was used for embalming, which actually helps keep insects from disturbing the corpse.Cedar oil is a mixture of organic compounds considered by the FDA to be a generally safe food additive preservative. The US EPA "anticipates no [toxic] effects in users of currently registered cedar oil products" because of their low levels of use and public exposure compared to case studies such as the US National Toxicology Program and more intermittent]).EPA believes that exposure to registered cedar wood pesticides poses negligible risk to humans and the environment when used correctly.

Uses

Each cedar oil has a characteristic woody smell that may change during the drying process.Crude oils are usually pale yellow or even darker in color, and some crudes, such as Texas cedar oil (mainly from juniper and J.deppeana), are very viscous and deposit crystals on standing.They are used (sometimes after distillation) in a range of fragrance applications such as soap fragrances, household sprays, floor polishes and insecticides.A small amount of cleaning oil for microscope work.All commercial cedar oils contain a group of chemically related compounds, the relative proportions of which depend on the species from which the oil was obtained.These compounds include cedrol and cedrene, and while they contribute to the overall oil's odor, they are also valuable to the chemical industry and can be converted into other derivatives with fragrance applications.Therefore, these oils can be used either directly or as a source of chemical isolates.Cedar oil was used by the ancient Sumerians as a base for paints.They would grind cobalt compounds in a mortar to produce blue pigments.They could get green from copper, yellow from lead antimonate, black from charcoal, and white from gypsum.

Today, cedar oil is often used for its aromatic properties, especially in aromatherapy; it can also be used to renew the scent of natural cedar furniture.Cedarwood oil is used as an insect repellant, either directly on the skin or as an additive to sprays, candles, and other products.In India, oil from cedar (Cedrus deodara, a true cedar) has been shown to have insecticidal and antifungal properties and has the potential to control fungal spoilage of spices during storage.One of the three methods of ancient Egyptian embalming practice was the use of cedar oil.It is a less costly alternative to the most famous practice in ancient Egypt,in which internal organs are removed and preserved individually in canopy jars. practice requires the injection of cedar oil into a body cavity without removing the internal organs.The corpse is placed in sodium or natron (a fixed alkali) for a prescribed period of time, and then cedar oil is released which dissolves the soft organs; the body, its flesh dissolved by natron, becomes a well-preserved skin and bone.Cedar oil was not widely used in oil immersion objectives in light microscopy until the development of synthetic immersion oils in the 1940s.It is also sometimes used to clarify emeralds.