Essential Oils 101 Vol. 2 - How do the Essential Oils work?

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I had started a series on Essential Oils last month and continuing in that, we shall discuss today about how do they really work for us?

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Also Read:

Essential Oils 101 Vol. 1 - What are Essential Oils?
Aromatherapy to control Mood Swings
How do I use Essential Oils?

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Now, essential oils are recommended for literally everything, even by ayurveda. For example, it is amazing in skin care or hair care or treating wounds or changing our moods. In fact, there is a separate range of edible essential oils. 

There is no scientific backing about how effective essential oils are (as I mentioned in the previous part of my series) but most people have seen positive outcomes after using them. But, how do these essential oils work? What are the essential oils made of? We shall be talking chemistry today so relax and let me try to make it as simple for you as possible, not that I understand whole lot of it!!

The Chemistry

Like all things in nature, essential oils are also made up of molecules. Essential Oils are organic compounds and made of hydrocarbons. A generic structure of any essential oil is made up of the organic components like monoterpenes, sesquiterpenes, phenols, alcohols, aldehydes and many more (Source). And, depending on the specific essential oil, the structure of these components vary which defines the exact nature and healing properties of the essential oils.

For example, oils with high monoterpene hydrocarbons react readily to air and heat which is why citrus oils oxidize more easily. Sesquiterpenes are anti-allergic and anti-inflammatory like chamomile and rose. Cinnamon and Clove oils have high concentration of phenols which is why they must be used in lower concentrations. Phenols are toxic in high quantities and require more work to excrete from the body.

To give an example, grapefruit has 86-92% d-limonene which is a monoterpene. Grapefruit contains 90-95% monoterpenes, 3-8% Tetraterpenes, 1-3% Aldehydes, and less than 3% Furanocoumarins, Sesquiterpenones, Alcohols and Thiols. So as we can see from the chemistry of essential oil that Grapefruit is a detoxifier, has cleansing properties because it is a mostly made of monoterpenes! Monotropenes also restore the correct information in the DNA of the cell once the sesquiterpenes and pheonlics have done their job. (Source)

Source : http://www.biospiritual-energy-healing.com/essential-oil-chemistry.html

How Essential Oils affect 'Emotional Brain'?

Do you love the sweet smell of Earth after the first shower of rain? It smells of happiness to me. So, this is what is called Aromatherapy. Our sense of smell has the power to alter our moods.

A smell can be overwhelmingly nostalgic because it triggers powerful images and emotions before we have time to edit them… When we give perfume to someone, we give them liquid memory. Kipling was right: “Smells are surer than sights and sounds to make your heart-strings crack.”

We need only eight molecules of a substance to trigger an impulse in a nerve ending, but forty nerve endings must be aroused before we smell something. (Source) 

Human body has an emotional brain called the limbic system which not only controls emotions but also the physical functions like heart rate, blood pressure, hormone production and release and many other such functions. It also has a olfactory cortex which is where any smell you inhale comes to and triggers response in your body.

So, basically, when you inhale an odor, it passes through the nasal passages in form of a protein. This protein is converted to electrical impulses when it reaches the cortex. So, whatever impulses the cortex receives, it sends the same messages to other organs. If you inhale a calming odor, the electric impulse tells the limbic system to relax and the system sends calming nerve impulses throughout the body.

Honestly, it is not as simple as this sounds but I have just given you a gist. For a detailed explanation, I would suggest you to check out this source.

Now we need to see how aromatherapy plays into all of this. Each of the essential oils has therapeutic properties, in that they are stimulating, calming, sedative, balancing, etc. When we inhale an essential oil molecule, it travels through the nasal passage to a receptor neuron that transports it up to the limbic brain, especially the hypothalamus. Remember that some of the functions of the hypothalamus are to regulate blood pressure, control heart rate and adjust hunger and thirst? Well, if you smell an essential oil that has a vibrationally calming effect on the body, and the hypothalamus receives the input to relax, then it creates neurochemicals that are sent through the body to relax and calm. Likewise if an essential oil has a frequency known to stimulate the body, then the limbic system will conform by sending the message to energize and become more active. Through this manner of transport, one can understand how aromatherapy oils can increase immunity, balance hormonal secretions, dampen or enliven hunger and thirst, and create sexual desire. (Source)

References

http://www.essentialoils.co.za/components.htm

http://www.experience-essential-oils.com/chemistry-of-essential-oil.html

http://www.biospiritual-energy-healing.com/essential-oil-chemistry.html

http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/04/10/how-smell-works-diane-ackerman-senses/

http://wisechoiceliving.com/our-brains-and-aromatherapy/

http://www.suzannebovenizer.com/aromatherapy-essential-oils/the-limbic-system

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