abstract clove oil and citronella oil from china were selected to evaluate their potential as skin-care ingredients. the gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (gc-ms) results showed that the main component of clove oil was eugenol, while citronellal was the main compound of citronella oil. clove oil exhibited prominent free radical scavenging activities (ic 50: 58 g/ml for o2 -. and 8.5 g/ml for abts+.) and strong inhibitory effect on lipid peroxidation, whilst citronella oil showed weaker antioxidative activities (ic 50: 150 g/ml for o2 -. and 500 g/ml for abts+.) and lipid peroxidation inhibitory efficiency. in addition, both oils revealed dose-dependence in protecting bovine serum albumin against uv-tio2-no2 - induced protein oxidation and tyrosine nitration injury. this study suggests that both clove oil and citronella oil could be used as new source of skin-care ingredient in the cosmetic industry. keywords: essential oilclove oil (syzygium aromaticum (l.) merr. & perry)citronella oil (cymbopogon goeringii)gas chromatography-mass spectrometryantioxidant acknowledgements this work was supported by the fundamental research funds for the central universities (hust no. 2010zd010).