Sha Shen

Sha Shen (沙參) is, in modern Chinese Pharmacopoeia usage without a Bei or Nan prefix, most commonly the dried root of Adenophora tetraphylla (Thunb.) Fisch. or Adenophora stricta Miq. (Campanulaceae), known specifically as Nan Sha Shen, perennial herbs of grassy slopes and forest margins across much of central and northern China. Plants grow 40–120 cm tall with whorled or alternate lanceolate to ovate serrate leaves and pendulous bell-shaped pale blue to violet flowers in summer racemes. The thick, conical, white to yellowish-white taproots are harvested in autumn, peeled, and sundried. In TCM, Sha Shen is classified as sweet and slightly cool, entering the Lung and Stomach channels, and is used to nourish yin, moisten the Lung, transform phlegm-heat, and generate fluids for dry cough, post-febrile dryness, and yin-deficiency thirst. Northern Sha Shen (Bei Sha Shen) refers instead to Glehnia littoralis (Apiaceae).