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Gyrinops walla, a member of Thymelaeaceae family produces valuable agarwood resin used
for religious, cultural and medicinal purposes in many countries. It is formed as a self-defense
mechanism to any stress caused physical, chemical or biological agents. Since a comparison
of agarwood formed due to natural and artificial causes was not done previously, the present
study was conducted to fulfill that objective. For this reason, 150 G. walla trees growing in
nine locations (Horawala, Kalatuwawa, Karandana, Maliboda, Neboda, Yagirala, Mirigama,
Kalawana and Suriyakanda) of wet zone, Sri Lank were selected for collecting agarwood
resins formed due to natural causes. Medium size G. walla trees growing in Horawala and
Kalawana were selected for formation of agarwood resins in artificial manner. Insertions of
iron nails, galvanised tubes, polyvinyl chloride tubes and polypropylene tubes were used as
the mechanical method; sodium chloride and sodium bi-carbonate were used as the chemical
method and forest mushroom mycelia was used as the biological method to form agarwood
resins. Three replicates were used for each agent and agarwood tissues were collected after 12
months of inoculation. Solvent extraction was used to extract agarwood resins and constituent
analysis was done by GC-FID method. It was possible to identify 21 compounds belonging to
seven classes, viz., agarospirol, vetispirane, selinene, cardinane, guaiene, eremophilane, 2-(2-
phenylehtyl)-chromone and fatty acids from naturally formed agarwood resins. However, 28
compounds were present in the resins formed due to artificial methods belonging to nine
classes. Among them agarofuran, and valencane were only found in the artificially formed
resins. Agarospirol and agarofuran are the most important compounds that produce the
characteristic aroma of agarwood resins. However, agarofuran was not observed from the
naturally formed agarwood resins. All compounds identified in this study are present in the
agarwood resins of Aquilaria species grown in Southeast Asian countries. The results
confirmed that artificially formed agarwood in G. walla chemically bears the same quality of
naturally produced agarwood.
