Understanding the fundamental role essential oils play in the practice of aromatherapy will broaden your knowledge and deepen your appreciation for the science underlying its success. In this lesson, you will get a basic overview of an essential oil’s role in plants and their importance. This is especially true for the aromatherapist – in understanding the connection between botany and clinical aromatherapy.

Since essential oils extracted from different plants, studying the botany of plants can be particularly beneficial in understanding how essential oils work and their chemical makeup.

Why Do Plants Make Essential Oils?

As stated earlier, aromatherapy is ‘the art and science of using essential oils derived from various plants for a variety of therapeutic applications.’ It is the plant’s natural oil that gives it a recognizable scent, with distinct characteristics and signature. Depending on a particular species, the plant will store its essential oil in different parts of its structure. This may be a flower’s petals, its leaves, its fruits, or in the rind of the fruit. In some plants like trees, it may be stored in its needles, bark, or roots.

Defense

Pollination

Protection

Allelopathy

Antitranspirant

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