Etlingera fulgens is a species of herbaceous perennial plant of the Zingiberaceae

Zingiberaceae

Zingiberaceae, or the Ginger family, is a family of flowering plants consisting of aromatic perennial herbs with creeping horizontal or tuberous rhizomes, comprising ca. 52 genera and more than 1300 species, distributed throughout tropical Africa, Asia, and the Americas.Many species are important...

 family. Botanical synonyms include Hornstedtia fulgens, Nicolaia fulgens, Phaeomeria fulgens. This species occurs in southern Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

 and peninsular Malaysia. Due to its bright red flowers and young leaves, E. fulgens is gaining popularity as an ornamental plant in landscape gardens.

Description

E. fulgens can be recognised by its shiny undulate leaves that are dark green in colour. When young, the underside leaves are bright red in colour, turning greenish on maturing. In older leaves, only the petiole and midrib are red. Petioles are 1.5 to 2 cm in length. Rhizomes, 3 cm in diameter, occur just below the ground. The plant can grow up to 4 – 5 metres tall. Crushed leaf sheaths emit a pleasant sour fragrance similar to that of Etlingera elatior

Etlingera elatior

Etlingera elatior is a species of herbaceous perennial plant...

. Inflorescences are raised above the ground and infructescences are globular in shape.

Chemistry

Leaves of E. fulgens displayed stronger ferrous ion chelating

Chelation

Chelation is the formation or presence of two or more separate coordinate bonds between apolydentate ligand and a single central atom....

 ability than young leaves of Camellia sinensis

Camellia sinensis

Camellia sinensis is the species of plant whose leaves and leaf buds are used to produce Chinese tea. It is of the genus Camellia , a genus of flowering plants in the family Theaceae. White tea, green tea, oolong, pu-erh tea and black tea are all harvested from this species, but are processed...

. Chlorogenic acid

Chlorogenic acid

Chlorogenic acid is a hydroxycinnamic acid, a member of a family of naturally occurring organic compounds. These are esters of polyphenolic caffeic acid and cyclitol -quinic acid. It is an important biosynthetic intermediate. It also is one of the phenols found in coffee, bamboo Phyllostachys...

 found in leaves of E. fulgens was higher in content than Lonicera japonica (Japanese Honeysuckle), the commercial source. Fruit and rhizome oils of E. fulgens are mainly aliphatic

Aliphatic compound

In organic chemistry, aliphatic compounds are acyclic or cyclic, non-aromatic carbon compounds.Thus, aliphatic compounds are opposite to aromatic compounds.- Structure :...

 hydrocarbon

Hydrocarbon

In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons from which one hydrogen atom has been removed are functional groups, called hydrocarbyls....

s with cyclododecane

Cyclododecane

Cyclododecane is an organic compound with the chemical formula C12H24.Cyclododecane is mainly used as an intermediate in production of flame retardants, detergents, and other chemicals....

, dodecanol

Dodecanol

Dodecanol, also known by its IUPAC name 1-dodecanol or dodecan-1-ol, and by its trivial name dodecyl alcohol and lauryl alcohol, is a fatty alcohol. Dodecanol is a colourless, water insoluble solid of melting point 24 °C and boiling point 259 °C. It has a floral odor...

 and cyclotetradecane as main constituents. Oils of E. fulgens and E. elatior

Etlingera elatior

Etlingera elatior is a species of herbaceous perennial plant...

were very different in composition despite having very similar aroma. Oils of E. fulgens consist mainly of dodecyl acetate (21.6%), an ester

Ester

Esters are chemical compounds derived by reacting an oxoacid with a hydroxyl compound such as an alcohol or phenol. Esters are usually derived from an inorganic acid or organic acid in which at least one -OH group is replaced by an -O-alkyl group, and most commonly from carboxylic acids and...

, and pentadecanol (14.1%) and hexadecanol (3.60%), both long-chain alcohol

Alcohol

In chemistry, an alcohol is an organic compound in which the hydroxy functional group is bound to a carbon atom. In particular, this carbon center should be saturated, having single bonds to three other atoms....

s.