The aim of this study was to determine how the addition of gold and silver nanoparticles to culture media affects the composition of essential oils extracted from Lavandula angustifolia propagated on MS media with the addition of 10 and 50 mg•dm-3 of gold (24.2 ± 2.4 nm) and silver (27.5 ± 4.8 nm) nanocolloids. The oil extracted from the lavender tissues propagated on the medium with 10 mg•dm-3 AgNPs (silver nanoparticles) differed the most with respect to the control; oil-10 compounds were not found at all, and 13 others were detected which were not present in the control oil. The addition of AuNPs (gold nanoparticles) and AgNPs to the media resulted in a decrease of lower molecular weight compounds (e.g., α- and β-pinene, camphene, δ-3-carene, p-cymene, 1,8-cineole, trans-pinocarveol, camphoriborneol), which were replaced by those of a higher molecular weight (τ- and α-cadinol 9-cedranone, cadalene, α-bisabolol, cis-14-nor-muurol-5-en-4-one, (E,E)-farnesol).
Keywords: elicitor; micropropagation; nanoparticles; secondary metabolites; shoot cultures.