Poria cocos

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Poria cocos (Chinese Pinyin: Fu Ling) is a medicinal mushroom, widely used and highly respected in Asia. In the wild, Poria cocos grows much like the European truffle, only it grows around the roots of certain pine trees instead of oaks. In traditional Chinese medicine, it is claimed to soothe the heart, disperse moisture and stagnation, strengthen vital energy, and assuage agitation; treat abdominal distension, edema, difficult urination, diabetes and diarrhea; enhance, protect, and restore liver function; modulate the immune system, balance blood sugar, and boost fat metabolism; have a whitening effect of skin, and reduce the appearance of pores and blackheads.^{[citation needed]} Poria cocos is almost unknown in Western medicine, and there have been no human clinical trials conducted to demonstrate any efficacy.

One of the reasons Poria cocos is so highly valued is because, as with other mushrooms, the active compounds are extremely easy to digest and assimilate.^{[citation needed]}