Eliciting increased flavonoids content in Ginkgo biloba leaves through exogenous salicylic acid and methyl jasmonate treatments

Prior to Ginkgo leaf harvest, we implemented four exogenous applications of salicylic acid (SA: 50, 80, and 100 mg·L−1) or methyl jasmonate (MJ: 20, 40, and 80 mg·L−1) as leaf spray to investigate their effect on flavonoids content and related enzyme activity. Compared with the control, a significant increase of 12% and 26% in flavonoid content was observed 7 days after the first application of 100 mg·L−1 SA and 20 mg·L−1 MJ, respectively; both were determined to be the best treatments. Operationally, administering either elicitor (SA or MJ) 1 week prior to leaf harvest is deemed to be the most practical and economic option. Additionally, enzymes activity involved in flavonoid metabolism (phenylalanine ammonia-lyase, cinnamate 4-hydroxylase, and 4-coumarate:coenzyme A ligase) and antioxidants (peroxidase, superoxide dismutase, and catalase) significantly increased in most SA and MJ treatments. The results strongly support Ginkgo leaf response to SA- or MJ-induced stress through increased nonenzymatic antioxidant compounds (flavonoids) and activity of antioxidant enzymes.

Ginkgo leaf sign on X-ray chest due to subcutaneous emphysema in a COVID-19 patient

Subcutaneous emphysema (SE) is usually encountered in cases of structural lung diseases and secondary to direct trauma or iatrogenic procedures for airway access. It is mostly associated with pneumothorax. The diagnosis is made clinically by palpation of the affected area and radiology. Here we presented a case of COVID-19 pneumonia presenting with extensive subcutaneous emphysema resulting in airway compression which was a very rare manifestation of COVID-19 infection. The COVID-19 infection led to extensive alveolar damage to the lungs and the chronic cough which may have led to this complication due to sudden change of pressure differences in the chest wall cavity. The limitation of using of personal protective equipments hindered the diagnosis of this condition as auscultation and the palpatory feelings were greatly hindered. The chest X-ray shows air in subcutaneous space and the prominence of the fibres of bilateral pectoralis muscles which gives an impression of the venous system of a Ginkgo leaf, so named as Ginkgo leaf sign.

Design and experimental study of ginkgo leaf picking device

To achieve the purpose of Ginkgo biloba leaves continuous harvesting, a ginkgo leaf picking device is designed. The device is consisted of a picking executive composed from a round rod picking hand and a rotating drum, a frame, a motor, a motor base, a coupling, a bearing seat, a motor support frame, a deciduous box, and a connecting screw. And the picking theoretical analysis and calculation are carried out. Finally, the feasibility of the design is verified by adjusting the tilt angle and motor speed of the picking device. The experimental results show that when the inclination angle between the picking device and the horizontal plane is 30° and the motor speed is 120 r/min, the damage rate of Ginkgo biloba leaves is 1.52%. The net collection rate is 94.29%, and the damage degree of branch and stem is mild.

Ginkgo leaf extract and dipyridamole injection for chronic cor pulmonale: a PRISMA-compliant meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

Ginkgo leaf extract and dipyridamole injection (GLED), a kind of Chinese herbal medicine preparation, has been considered as a promising supplementary treatment for chronic cor pulmonale (CCP). Although an analysis of the published literature has been performed, the exact effects and safety of GLED have yet to be systematically investigated. Therefore, a wide-ranging systematic search of electronic databases from which to draw conclusions was conducted. All randomized controlled trials concerning the GLED plus conventional treatments for CCP were selected in the present study. Main outcomes were treatment efficacy, blood gas and hemorrheology indexes, and adverse events. Data from 28 trials with 2457 CCP patients were analyzed. The results indicated that, compared with conventional treatments alone, the combination of conventional treatments with GLED obviously improved the markedly effective rate (RR = 1.44, 95% CI = 1.31–1.58, P < 0.00001) and total effective rate (RR = 1.28, 95% CI = 1.18–1.38, P < 0.00001). Moreover, the hemorrheology (PaO2, P < 0.00001; PaCO2, P < 0.00001; SaO2, P < 0.00001; pH value, P = 0.05) and blood gas indexes (PV, WBHSV, WBMSV, WBLSV, hematocrit and FBG, P < 0.01) of CCP patients were also significantly ameliorated after the combined therapy. The frequency of adverse events did not differ significantly between the two groups (P > 0.05). In summary, evidence from the meta-analysis suggested that the combination of conventional treatments and GLED appeared to be effective and relatively safe for CCP. Therefore, GLED mediated therapy could be recommended as an adjuvant treatment for CCP.

Using Deep Learning for Image-Based Different Degrees of Ginkgo Leaf Disease Classification

Diseases from Ginkgo biloba have brought great losses to medicine and the economy. Therefore, if the degree of disease can be automatically identified in Ginkgo biloba leaves, people will take appropriate measures to avoid losses in advance. Deep learning has made great achievements in plant disease identification and classification. For this paper, the convolution neural network model was used to classify the different degrees of ginkgo leaf disease. This study used the VGGNet-16 and Inception V3 models. After preprocessing and training 1322 original images under laboratory conditions and 2408 original images under field conditions, 98.44% accuracy was achieved under laboratory conditions and 92.19% under field conditions with the VGG model. The Inception V3 model achieved 92.3% accuracy under laboratory conditions and 93.2% under field conditions. Thus, the Inception V3 model structure was more suitable for field conditions. To our knowledge, there is very little research on the classification of different degrees of the same plant disease. The success of this study will have a significant impact on the prediction and early prevention of ginkgo leaf blight.

Prolonging the lifetimes of plasmonic hot electrons for efficient hydrogen evolution by Ag@N,O-C interfaces with a unique ginkgo-leaf hierarchical structure

N,O-doped C layers fully-coated Ag nanoparticles have assembled to form into a three-level hierarchical structure, which have shown highly-improved photocatalytic activity toward hydrogen production reaction from water.