Essential Oils - Lemon

Botanical Name: Citrus limon

• Oil Properties

• History behind this oil

• Who can benefit from this oil?

• How to use this oil

• Method of Extraction

• Precautions

• How to buy Genuine Essential Oil?

• Blends Well With

 Oil Properties

This oil has a sharp and fresh smell with a pale greenish-yellow color. Lemon oil is a citrus oil and thus very rich in vitamins and well known for its importance in skin and beauty care.

This oil is low in consistency, means it is light citrus oil with a strong smell. This oil does not stay's long and if used for aromatherapy, it should be used before 12 months.

The main chemical components of Lemon oil are Limonene, Citronella, Phellandrene, Citral and Citroptene.

History behind this oil

The Lemon tree is an evergreen tree that has its root in Asia with around 50 varieties grown now. This oil has been used as a flavoring agent in food items and perfumery agent in beauty products from a long time.

But Lemon actually derived its name from from the Arabic 'laimun' or Persian 'limun' and was brought to Europe by the Crusaders in the Middle Ages.

Japanese are also using lemon oil from long time and use in banks to reduce worker-error apart from other common uses.

Lemon has a high content of vitamins A, B and C and an ounce a day was given to sailors in the Royal Navy to alleviate scurvy and other vitamin deficiencies.

There is also some facts available that lemon originated in china and ten went to Italy and the Mediterranean by Arabian merchants. Also lemon like fruit can be seen in mosaics at Pompeii but botanists say that lemon was not well known in Romen Empire. However, the fact is lemon did not become famous until 16th century but earlier records show that lemon came into existence from Hispaniola (Haiti/Dominican Republic), where it arrived with Columbus in 1493.

Who can benefit from this oil?

Lemon is a very therapeutic oil and works as anti-acid, anti-sclerotic, antibiotic, sedative, carminative, anti neuralgic, diuretic, astringent, digestive, anti-spasmodic, antiseptic, antipyretic, and helps in relaxation of the bowel.

This oil is very much used and shows good results with people suffering from asthma, bronchitis, bad digestive system, headaches, arthritis, rheumatism, throat infections, flu, cellulite, mouth ulcers, constipation, Athlete's foot, chilblains, warts, herpes, insect bites, dyspepsia, fever, high blood pressure, varicose veins and helps with nosebleeds.

Lemon is considered very good for hair, oily skin, dull skin or any type of skin related problems.

How to use this oil

Lemon oil is used a lot in many treatments as we have seen, lets see how to use this oil with different methods and for different disorders.

This oil is excellent when mixed in bathing water or can be blended with other oils too; it gives a skin a very fresh look and rejuvenated the skin. Bathing also helps to fight stress, fatigue, obesity, depression, infections and works a general tonic.

Massaging is also a good way to use essential oil. Before messaging make sure it is mixed with some carrier oil to make it dilute, massage whole body or the affected area and feel relaxed.

One can also use burners and vaporizers to sooth cold, voice loss, stress, depression, fatigue and rejuvenate the body.

Steam inhalation can work wonders with just a 2 drops of oil dissolved in a bowl of hot water, just cover your head with a towel and take deep breath in and out. What will happen is the vapor will enter your facial skin for enhance beauty, as well it will improve mucous membrane of nose and throat, which will further improve respiratory system and related diseases.

Lemon oil can be used in a base cream, in a lotion or as a mouthwash, for mouth ulcers and throat infections and for oily skin.

Method of Extraction

Extraction method completely depends on the plant material and that is why every method is not suitable for every essential oil. For extracting lemon oil from the fresh fruit peel cold pressed or expressed extraction method is good.

Earlier most of the extraction processes for citrus essences where done by hand where the fruit pulp was removed, the rind and pith then soaked in warm water to make the rind more flexible, since the pith of the fruit absorbed the water.

After the fruit has absorbed the water and become more elastic, it was inverted which helped to split the oil cells and a sponge placed next to the outer layer. It was then squeezed to release the volatile oil, which was then collected directly into the sponge.

As soon as the sponge became saturated with oil, it was squeezed and the essential oil collected in a vessel and then decanted.

However, Machine abrasion, which is similar to other methods of expression extraction is simpler and needs less efforts.

The cold pressed citrus oils are commercial produced just this way, by machines, which score the rind and capture the resulting oil. Although many citrus oils are also produced by steam distillation, they seem to lack the vibrancy of the cold pressed oils.

Precautions

This oil is non-toxic oil but can cause infection, rashes or redness to the skin to people whose skin is very sensitive. Its also not very potent but should be used in proper amount, not more then that else may cause anxiety or irritation due to adverse response.

This oil is also phototoxic oil, which means it should not be used before going under sun. Even diluted oil can harm you.

Always use diluted oil mixed with some carrier oil before massaging.

If this oil used in skin care cooking, always use certified organic essential oils.

How to buy Genuine Essential Oil?

Essential oils have to be Genuine, authentic, unadulterated, pure, holistic, and therapeutic to provide you the desired results. However, it is not so easy to figure out the purity and quality of oils. So many factors contribute for the oil to be pure.

Well as we know, many essential oils are quite expense cause of the process of manufacturing it, like Jasmine oil which cannot be inexpensive cause of its cost of harvesting and production.

Only genuine essential oils can guarantee the anticipated healing effect. This is the fact and one should be aware of some basic factors before purchasing essential oil. Tell me what is the use of purchasing something that is expensive and not genuine. Mostly these oils are mixed with some carrier oils and people are easily fooled. However, blends of essential oil and carrier oil are also available in the market, but that should be specified.

However, there are some important things to note down, like which family the oil belongs too, botanical name of the oil should be specified on the bottle, country of origin also matters, and smelling the oil can also work. One should try to become used to the aroma by smelling them when ever you a get chance, buy from genuine dealer and check out the spellings of oil on the bottle before purchasing.

When buying a oil make sure the documentation should contain information about the growth, harvest, distillation, and chemical make-up of the oil, however, even though we ask, sometimes we don't get it cause it can be wrong. There are many tests too to check the purity of the oil but they are too expensive. So our suggestion is to know the oil by yourself and do remember the things we have discussed.

Essential oil yields within plants differ enormously. Some plants, such as rose and melissa, have very low oil yields and are consequently very expensive. Others, such as eucalyptus, have much higher oil yields and therefore tend to be less expensive. It should be noted that price is not necessarily an indicator of quality but if all oils on sale are the same price, then this is generally a sign that the oils could be synthetic, adulterated or blended products, often with dilutions of less than 10% of essential oil. Diluted products should be clearly labeled as ready-mixed massage oils.

Therefore, when purchasing individual pure essential oils. Do make sure that they are clearly labeled with the words 'Pure Essential Oil' and not just 'Essential Oil' or 'Aromatherapy Oil' which does not specify exactly what is in the bottle and can be very, very misleading.

Blends Well With:

Lemon oil blends particularly well with: Lavender, Rose, Sandalwood, Benzoin, Eucalyptus, Geranium, Fennel, Juniper, Neroli and Elemi.