Investigation of ginsenosides in different tissues after elicitor treatment in Panax ginseng

Abstract

BackgroundThe effect of methyl jasmonate (MJ) on ginsenoside production in different organs of ginseng (Panax ginseng Meyer) was evaluated after the whole plant was dipped in an MJ-containing solution. MJ can induce the production of antioxidant defense genes and secondary metabolites in plants. In ginseng, MJ treatment in adventitious root resulted in the increase of dammarenediol synthase expression but a decrease of cycloartenol synthase expression, thereby enhancing ginsenoside biosynthesis. Although a previous study focused on the application of MJ to affect ginsenoside production in adventitious roots, we conducted our research on entire plants by evaluating the effect of exogenous MJ on ginsenoside production with the aim of obtaining new approaches to study ginsenoside biosynthesis response to MJ in vivo.MethodsDifferent parts of MJ-treated ginseng plants were analyzed for ginsenoside contents (fine root, root body, epidermis, rhizome, stem, and leaf) by high-performance liquid chromatography.ResultsThe total ginsenoside content of the ginseng root significantly increased after 2 d of MJ treatment compared with the control not subjected to MJ. Our results revealed that MJ treatment enhances ginsenoside production not in the epidermis but in the stele of the ginseng root, implying transportation of ginsenosides from the root vasculature to the epidermis. Application of MJ enhanced protopanaxadiol (PPD)-type ginsenosides, whereas chilling treatment induced protopanaxatriol (PPT)-type ginsenosides.ConclusionThese findings indicate that the production of PPD-type and PPT-type ginsenosides is differently affected by abiotic and biotic stresses in the ginseng plant, and they might play different defense mechanism roles.

Effect of temperature on morphology, ginsenosides biosynthesis, functional genes, and transcriptional factors expression in Panax ginseng adventitious roots

“…Next finding was that a certain hypothermic stimulation could promote the accumulation of active components. Oh et al () found that all total ginsenosides content in different organs from 1‐year‐old root increased after treatment at 4°C. Similarly, the level of genistein in Glycine max.…”

Biosynthesis and biotechnological production of ginsenosides

“…Extensive investigations have revealed that a large portion of the intact ginsenosides can be transformed into minor ginsenosides with more enhancing biological effects through gastrointestinal acids, enzymes, and intestinal bacteria, especially by β-glucosidase enzymes in human intestine (Christensen, 2009), therefore the enzymatic methods have been used to obtain minor ginsenosides. Recently, several studies have succeeded to conduct scale-up engineering for the bioconversion using a recombinant enzymes, particularly for ginsenoside Rg3 (Chang et al, 2009;Kim et al, 2013c;Oh et al, 2014b;Shin et al, 2014;Quan et al, 2012;2013) (Table 2). However, due to the limited availability of ginsenosides for large scale compound K production, and the challenge of chemical synthesis caused by the difficulty of selective glycosylation of ginsenosides, other approaches have been explored.…”

Genome and evolution of the shade‐requiring medicinal herb Panax ginseng

“…Therapeutic effects of P. ginseng on neurodegenerative disorders (Cho, ; Radad et al ., ), cardiovascular diseases (Zheng et al ., ), diabetes (Xie et al ., ) and cancer (Jung et al ., ; Wong et al ., ) are often attributed to unique saponins called ginsenosides, glycosylated triterpenes classified as either dammarane‐ ( Panax ‐specific) or oleanane‐type based on aglycone skeletal structure. Ginsenosides are accumulated in roots, leaves, stems, flower buds and berries, in quantities varying with tissue (Oh et al ., ; Shi et al ., ), age (Shi et al ., ; Xiao et al ., ), environment (Jiang et al ., ; Kim et al ., ) and cultivar (Lee et al ., ). Limited genomic resources and genetic populations due to slow growth (~4 years/generation), sensitivity to environmental stresses and low seed yield (40/generation) hamper developmental and genetic studies and breeding.…”