Mutations are implicated in many important human diseases, including arteriosclerosis, autoimmune diseases, some types of diabetes and cancer. Antimutagenic agents from medicinal and aromatic plants are considered to be important for primary prevention.

In last 10 years, in our laboratory, over 25 differently prepared extracts of wild and cultivated sage, as well as pure constituents, were screened for antimutagenic potential against UV- and EtBr-induced mutations. These included terpenoid fractions obtained from ethanolic extracts at different CO₂ pressure; essential oils and their fractions; monoterpenoids: camphor, a+b thujone, 1,8-cineole, limonene, myrcene, and linalool; diterpenoids: rosmanol 9-ethyl ether, carnosic acid 12-methyl ether, carnosic acid 12-methyl ether g-lactone and triterpenoid oleanic acid.

A set of newly constructed E. coli strains, aimed at the detection of spontaneous and induced mutations and at the estimation of the mechanisms of antimutagenic action, was used along with S. typhimurium (Ames) strains TA98, TA100 and TA102. Moreover, S. cerevisiae D7 strain was used as eukaryotic model system.

The obtained results have shown that monoterpenoids from sage inhibit UV-induced mutagenesis by modulating DNA repair pathways. On the other hand, terpenoids of high molecular weight inhibit EtBr-induced mutations by interfering with metabolic activation of the mutagen.