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Gyrinops w a lla is the only agarwood producing tree growing in Sri Lanka which is believed to be endemic
Agarwood is valuable resinous heartwood of Thymalaeaceae family. Present study is aimed to identify
the characteristics of naturally formed agarwood type resins in G. w a lla stems. S am ples were isolated
from trees growing three different location in the wet zone of Sri Lanka. Naturally formed resinous part
of wood was solvent extracted and analysed by GCMS. Further, the current study has developed an
effective GCMS method to analyse agarwood type resin from G. w a lla . Tree diameters and the heights
varied in the trees samples, which had no effect on resin formation. Resin contents were not significantly
different between three populations although die chemical variations were considerably high. Among
the 19 constituents identified by GCMS in the agarwood resins, free fatty acids and isopropyl naphthalene, 2-phenylethyl chromone compounds found to be common for most of the G. w a lla trees tested.
Comonly found sesquiterpene compounds from the G. w a lla resin were Jinkhol, y-eudesmol. valerenol
and valerinal. Similar compounds have been reported in resin from A q u lia ria spp. which is the more
established source of agarwood. A future study would experiment on artificial resin induction methods
and establishing plantations of G. w a lla to sustain its supply
