How can cannabis compounds be used to improve skin health? This is what a recent study published in the Journal of Natural Products hopes to address as an international team of researchers reported the discovery of a new cannabis compound derived from Cannabis sativa that could provide skin health benefits. This study has the potential to help scientists, medical professionals, and the public better understand the health benefits of cannabis and the steps that can be taken to enhance them.
The study notes, “Cannabis sativa has been used since ancient times for recreational, ornamental, industrial, and medicinal chemistry purposes. From this plant, more than 500 compounds have been isolated to date, of which around 150 belong to the class of phytocannabinoids.”
For the study, the researchers announced the discovery of cannabizetol, which is a naturally occurring dimeric cannabinoid compound. The discovery was made by analyzing the compound’s chemical structure, during which they discovered it possesses significant applications for dermatology. This includes skin inflammatory conditions and demonstrates greater promise than known dimeric cannabinoid compounds.
The study notes, “These results highlight cannabizetol as a promising bioactive metabolite with potential dermatological applications. To further enable its study, we developed a continuous flow approach to optimize the preparation of these dimers, achieving a substantial reduction in reaction times.”
This study comes as Labroots recently reported on cannabis being used to treat skin cancer and a variety of pigmentation disorders. Additionally, this study comes as the technology needed to identify new cannabis compounds continues to improve while building off a growing list of studies who have successfully discovered new cannabis compounds as recently as earlier this year.
How will cannabizetol help improve skin health in the coming years and decades? Only time will tell, and this is why we science!
As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!
Sources: Journal of Natural Products, Marijuana Moment, Labroots