Effect of shade on the morphological and chemical constituents in Kaempheria parviflora Wall. ex Baker

Kaempheria parviflora Wall. ex Baker (family: Zingiberaceae) commonly called as black ginger is an important medicinal plant used in traditional healing practices. At present the plant is in great demand and is extracted injudiciously from the wild resources. The rhizome is the economic part which is used for its various medicinal properties. The species is often cultivated under various degrees of shades and the morphological growth, rhizome yield and chemical constituents are affected by light intensity. Different genotypes need to be documented for better yield and high chemical contents. In the present study, five genotypes collected from different parts of North East India were grown in open and shade conditions to document the differences in morphological-yield characters and their chemical constituents. GCMS was applied to check the volatile and non volatile compounds present in the different genotypes under shade and open conditions. It was found that all the 5 genotypes have significant differences in the morphological and yield characters and the shade conditions had a significant effect on the morphological and yield characters. The genotype (G2) and the shade condition (S1) condition performed best in terms of yield of rhizome. In terms of interaction effect, G2S1 shows the highest yield of the economic component. The composition of chemical constituents among the five genotypes was observed to vary under shaded and open conditions. Initiating proper scientific methods could validate their traditional uses and potentially unlock a source of new drugs in the near future.