Ginger plant

 

The ginger plant is a herbaceous perennial grown as an annual crop. The plant is erect, has many fibrous roots, aerial shoots (pseudostem) with leaves, and the underground stem (rhizome). The roots of ginger are of two types, fibrous and fleshy. After planting, many roots having indefinite growth grow out of the base of the sprouts. These are the fibrous roots, and the number of such roots keeps on increasing with the growth of tillers. These fibrous roots are thin, have root hairs, and their function is mainly absorption of water and nutrients. As a ginger plant grows further, several fleshy roots of indefinite growth are produced from the lower nodes of the mother ginger and primary fingers. These roots are thicker, milky white in color, with few root hairs, and no lateral roots. Such roots carry out the functions of support as well as absorption. During the initial growth, the apical bud of the rhizome piece planted grows out and becomes the main tiller or mother tiller. As this tiller grows, its base enlarges into a rhizome. This is the first formed rhizome knob and is often called the mother rhizome. From either side of the mother rhizome, branches arise and they grow out and become the primary tillers. The bases of these tillers become enlarged and develop into the primary fingers. The buds on these primaries develop in turn into secondary tillers and their bases into secondary fingers. The buds on the secondary fingers in turn can develop into tertiary tillers and tertiary fingers.

The aerial shoots have many narrow leaves borne on very short petioles and with sheaths that are long and narrow, and the overlapping sheaths produce the aerial shoot. A pair of ligules is formed at the junction of leaves and sheath. The leaves are arranged in a distichous manner.

Ginger is a subterranean stem (rhizome) modified for the vegetative propagation and storage of food materials. The stem has nodes with scale leaves and internodes. Except for the first few nodes, all the nodes have axillary buds. When the rhizome bit is used for planting ("seed rhizome" or setts), there may be one or more apical buds on it; however, normally only one bud becomes active. When large pieces are used, more than one bud may develop simultaneously. If more than one branch from the parent rhizome is responsible for the ultimate growth and development of the adult rhizome, the branches of the mature rhizome lie in the same plane (Shah and Raju, 1975a)
Ginger is commonly used to treat various types of "stomach problems," including motion sickness, morning sickness, colic, upset stomach, gas, diarrhea, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), nausea, nausea caused by cancer treatment, nausea caused by HIV/AIDS treatment, nausea and vomiting after surgery, as well as loss of appetite.