Phytochemical investigations on <i>Artemisia alba</i> Turra growing in the North-East of Italy

<p><i>Artemisia alba</i> Turra (Asteraceae) is an Euro-Mediterranean plant used in Veneto (North-East of Italy) as traditional medicine for the treatment of various diseases. <i>A. alba</i> is a taxonomically problematic species, characterised by common polymorphism leading to a quite high variability in secondary metabolites content. Nonetheless, the phytochemical knowledge on its phytoconstituents, especially non-volatile components, is limited. In the present paper, the phytochemical composition of a tincture obtained from the aerial parts of <i>A. alba</i> growing in Veneto is presented. Extensive chromatographic separations led to the isolation of three new sesquiterpene derivatives, whose structures were elucidated by 1D and 2D NMR experiments and mass spectrometry. Furthermore, flavonoid composition and volatile constituents of the tincture of <i>A. alba</i> were preliminary studied by HPLC–MSⁿ and GC–MS, respectively.</p