Search

This article aims to understand the global and longitudinal trends of research on Panax ginseng. We used bibliometrics to analyze 3974 papers collected from the Web of ScienceTM Core Collection database during 1959--2016. The number of publications showed a steady growth before 2000 and exponentially increased in stage III (2000--2016, about 86% of the papers were published). Research on P. ginseng was conducted in 64 countries, mainly in Asia; in particular, 41% and 28% of the publications were from South Korea and China, respectively. The institutions from South Korea and China had high publication output and close cooperation and provided the majority of financial support. All top 10 authors and four of the top 20 journals in terms of number of publications originated from South Korea. The leading research subjects were pharmacology (39%), plant science (26%), and integrative complementary medicine (19%). The hotspot of P. ginseng research transformed from basic science to application, and multidisciplinary sciences will play a substantial role in the future. This study provides a comprehensive analysis to elucidate the global distribution, collaboration patterns, and research trends in the P. ginseng domain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The commercial use of Panax ginseng berries is increasing as P. ginseng berries are known to contain large amounts of ginsenosides, and many pharmacological activities have been reported for the various ginsenosides. For the proper use of P. ginseng berries, it is necessary to study efficient and accurate quality control and the profiling of the overall composition of each cultivar. Ginseng berry samples from seven cultivars (Eumseung, Chung-buk Province, Republic of Korea) were analyzed using ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole-time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-QTOF/MS) for profiling of the ginsenosides, and high-resolution magic-angle-spinning nuclear magnetic resonance (HR-MAS NMR) spectroscopy for profiling of the primary metabolites. Comparing twenty-six ginsenoside profiles between the variant representatives and between the violet-stem variant, Kumpoong and Sunwon were classified. In the case of primary metabolites, the cultivars Kumpoong and Gopoong were classified. As a result of correlation analyses of the primary and secondary metabolites, in the Gopoong cultivar, the metabolism was found to lean toward energy metabolism rather than ginsenoside synthesis, and accumulation of osmolytes was low. The Gopoong cultivar had higher levels of most of the amino acids, such as arginine, phenylalanine, isoleucine, threonine, and valine, and it contained the highest level of choline and the lowest level of myo-inositol. Except for these, there were no significant differences of primary metabolites. In the Kumpoong cultivar, the protopanaxatriol (PPT)-type ginsenosides, ginsenoside Re and ginsenoside Rg2, were much lower than in the other cultivars, while the other PPT-type ginsenosides were inversely found in much higher amounts than in other cultivars. The Sunwon cultivar showed that variations of PPT-type ginsenosides were significantly different between samples. However, the median values of PPT-type ginsenosides of Sunwon showed similar levels to those of Kumpoong. The difference in primary metabolites used for metabolism for survival was found to be small in our results. Our data demonstrated the characteristics of each cultivar using profiling data of the primary and secondary metabolites, especially for Gopoong, Kumpoong, and Sunwon. These profiling data provided important information for further research and commercial use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]