As the cannabis industry continues its explosive growth rates, innovative products and scientific knowledge drive the market place. Sproutly claims to have found an accelerated path to recognition with their Aqueous Phytorecovery Process.
While Sproutly may have been operating quietly, the announcement of their technology that represents a potential paradigm shift in extraction methods could change the process used to infuse edibles and drinks with cannabinoids. And that news, especially once bolstered with the data, is big.
Conventional wisdom illustrates the hydrophobicity of cannabinoids, meaning that they aren’t water soluble. This fact has caused problems with the effects of ingredients in edibles and drinks because the body must digest the active ingredient before it disperses through the bloodstream.
Sometimes onset is delayed,and there is no guarantee as to when the effects will end. Also, the amount of these ingredients that are actually absorbed through the bloodstream is inconsistent. As a result, “beverage products are currently limited to the use of emulsifiers or oil nanoparticles and no true solutions in water. These not only limit proper delivery to the body but also prevent a broader acceptance of the current products.”
The Science
Sproutly and Infusion Biosciences claims to have discovered natural, water-soluble derivatives of molecules similar to terpenes and cannabinoids within the cannabis plant. Their Aqueous Phytorecovery Process uses patent-pending, aqueous reagents formulated explicitly for plant material to gently extract the water-soluble molecules. Unlike oil-based extraction products, the molecules extracted into the water have immediate bioavailability. What remains to be elucidated, however, are how these molecules contribute to the medicinal effects we’ve come to comprehend when discussing water-insoluble terpenes and cannabinoids.
The Sproutly technology, when complemented with the data, could have profound effects on the absorption and release process of ingesting phytomolecules from cannabis. It uses a two-step method to soak cannabis in the aqueous reagents and then filtration and straining to capture the “natural water-soluble entourage.” A second soaking step is performed using the leftover biomass that was strained and filtered in Step 1, and this mixture is then re-strained and re-filtered to increase the recovery of water-soluble molecules.
The Aqueous Phytorecovery Process is said to allow Sproutly to provide edibles and drinks that give predictable and desired therapeutic effects. Their Infuz2O product is reported to have an onset of less than 5 minutes and an offset of approximately 90 minutes.
At this time, Sproutly has not published the list of water-soluble analogues to terpenes and cannabinoids, and so what these analogues are chemically is a mystery. We at Extraction Magazine look forward to their release of this information.
