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Background
Methods for measuring triterpene content need improvement
More than 200 triterpenes have been found in lingzhi, but ganoderic acids with known pharmacological activity are hard to extract and purify for use as reference standards. So at present, oleanolic acid or ursolic acid, which are common in plants, are mostly used as references, with measuring “total triterpenes”. This method has low specificity, results vary widely between products, and it is hard to use for judging product quality. Measuring with using ganoderic acids as standards is highly specific and reflects the true triterpene content. The triterpene content of lingzhi spore powder is also very low.
Book on lingzhiSummarized from a published book; verifiable by title and ISBNPublished book · see title and ISBN in the sourceHow the study was done
Drawn from the section “Methods for measuring polysaccharide and triterpene content in lingzhi products need improvement”.
What the researchers say
The quality standard for lingzhi fruiting bodies published by the United States Pharmacopeia in 2014 uses exactly this approach of measuring the total of several specific ganoderic acids, requiring dried fruiting bodies to contain at least 0.3% triterpenes.
Source
Lin Zhibin (ed.), 灵芝从神奇到科学 [Lingzhi: From Mystery to Science], 3rd ed., Peking University Medical Press, 2018, ISBN 978-7-5659-1844-5, Ch. 3 and 15
Checked against the book Last updated: 2026-10-06