Star anise essential oil：chemical compounds, antifungal and antioxidant activities: a review

Star anise essential oil (SAO) is volatile oil extracted from star anise fruits (Illicium verum Hook. f) with a highly anise flavour and is widely used in food and pharmaceutical industries because of its antimicrobial and antioxidant properties. With the growing public concern about food safety, research concerning safe and effective food preservatives has gained increasing attention. In the past few years, many papers have reported the in vitro antifungal and antioxidant activities of SAO. This paper aims to provide evidences that SAO may be used for prolonging shelf life of food products. For such purpose, this paper reviews the advances of research on the chemical composition, antifungal and antioxidant activities of SAO. The functional bioactive components in SAO and the antifungal mechanism of action are also summarized. SAO may have good potential as food preservative in food industry.