Etlingera maingayi 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 Amomum maingayi Baker, Hornstedtia maingayi, Nicolaia maingayi and Phaeomeria maingayi. 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...

, where its flowers are eaten as vegetables, and Malaysia.

Description

E. maingayi grows to less than 2 metres height. Its leaves are variable, with undulate fringes and emit a sour scent when crushed. Young leaves are translucent and reddish on both sides.

Chemistry

Leaves of E. maingayi displayed 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 and lipid

Lipid

Lipids constitute a broad group of naturally occurring molecules that include fats, waxes, sterols, fat-soluble vitamins , monoglycerides, diglycerides, triglycerides, phospholipids, and others...

 peroxidation inhibition activity that were much higher 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...

. Leaves of E. maingayi had the highest yield of oil (1320 mg/100 g) consisting mainly of lauric acid

Lauric acid

Lauric acid , the saturated fatty acid with a 12-carbon atom chain, is a white, powdery solid with a faint odor of bay oil or soap.-Occurrence:...

 (45%) and decanoic acid

Decanoic acid

Decanoic acid, or capric acid, is a saturated fatty acid.Its formula is CH38COOH. Salts and esters of decanoic acid are called decanoates...

 (43%). It is likely that the unpleasant sour scent of leaves when crushed may be due to these two acids. Oils from leaves of E. maingayi inhibited Gram-positive bacteria.