Research on chemical constituents, anti-bacterial and anti-cancer effects of components isolated from Zingiber officinale Roscoe from Vietnam

Ginger, a commonly used spice and medicinal herb, is an abundant source of bioactive compounds. However, the utilization of ginger in the pharmaceutical industry is still moderate and not commensurate with the potential of the Vietnamese horticulture industry, mainly due to a lack of information about the quality of input materials. In this study, we compared the volatile compounds of gingers collected from 13 provinces of Vietnam using GC/MS and GC-FID analysis to provide a basis for selecting and standardizing input materials. Furthermore, ginger essential oil from Ben Tre province of Vietnam exhibited significant antibacterial activity particularly in inhibiting Gram-positive bacteria, including S. aureus and S. epidermidis, with inhibition zones of 30.00 ± 1.41 and 24.67 ± 3.30 mm, respectively. However, no significant inhibition was observed against Gram-negative bacteria P. aeruginosa and E. coli. We also isolated 5 non-volatile compounds from ginger extract, namely 6-shogaol (1), quercetin (2), rutin (3), beta-sitosterol (4) and beta-sitosterol-3-O-beta-D-glucopyranoside (5). Among them, compounds 1–3 displayed cytotoxicity against Hep3B, SK-LU-1, MCF-7, SK-LU-1, SW480 and HepG2 tumour cell lines, with an IC50 values ranging between 62.7 ± 2.1 and 97.6 ± 1.1 µM, using Ellipticine as a positive control. Compounds 4 and 5 showed cytotoxicity against Hep3B and HepG2 tumor cells, with the IC50 values ranging between 21.5 ± 5.1 and 46.9 ± 3.7 µM but did not exhibit any significant cytotoxicity against SW480 and SK-LU-1 cells. Compound 4 also demonstrated middling cytotoxicity against the MCF7 cell line, with an IC50 value of 43.6 ± 5.1 µM. These findings suggest further applications of Vietnamese ginger for the treatment of infectious and cancer-related diseases.