Analysis of phenolic compounds in leaves from endemic trees from Madeira Island. A contribution to the chemotaxonomy of Laurisilva forest species

• The phenolic composition of four trees native to Madeira Archipelago was studied.
• This is the first study regarding the chemical composition of these plants.
• Phenolic acids, flavonoids, and procyanidins were the most abundant compounds.
• These plants could be used as a source of phenolics with industrial applications.

Phenolic compounds present high antioxidant activity and, therefore, health promoting effects, serving as a type of preventive medicine. Hence, research on the chemical composition of plants with potential antioxidant value is of high interest.Forest cleaning, thinning, and pruning are beneficial activities that help maintaining healthy forests. In addition, they can provide vegetal material as source of valuable bioactive compounds that can have health promoting effects. In this work, the phenolic composition of several trees native to Madeira Archipelago (Portugal) was studied. Specifically, the leaves from Olea europaea ssp. cerasiformis, Ilex perado ssp. perado, Clethra arborea, and Heberdenia excelsa have been analyzed. The screening of the main phenolic compounds from their methanolic extracts has been carried out using high-performance liquid chromatography with electrospray ionization mass spectrometric detection (HPLC-ESI-MSn). This is the first report on the phenolic composition of these Madeira native species, and more than 100 compounds have been detected and identified or tentatively characterized.