Conclusion
Chemical consistency and potency due to active compounds are in turn important in producing consistent and reliable medical cannabis extracts and their derivatives. These processes must be subject to higher levels of scientific rigor as the patient population around the world are seeking the help of such extracts for various clinical conditions, and as medical cannabis industry is receiving acceptance in various countries.
Methods
Patients consuming medical cannabis often have limited alternative treatment options and in recent years, medical cannabis extracts have been popular as a substitute for dried cannabis plants, despite limited studies on these derivatives. We investigated three disparate cannabis cultivars and compared four chemical extraction methods head to head, viz. Soxhlet, ultrasound-assisted supercritical fluid, and microwave-assisted extractions, for their efficiency. We further characterized the chemical compositions of these extracts.
Results
Microwave extraction consistently produced completely decarboxylated phytocannabinoid extracts. Factors such as temperature and exposure time play important roles in the decarboxylation of phytocannabinoids, thereby generating pharmacologically active CBs, and these conditions may differ for each cannabis cultivar.