D8 spectral analysis + HU-331 reduction

Alright–2 topics I’d like to throw out this morning.

  1. Just had a UV-Vis spectrophotometer gifted to my lab. I used to use these a lot for drug encapsulation studies for hydrophobic compounds in nanoparticle systems–basically, you just construct a standard curve, with absorbance (mAU) as a linear function of the concentration of the compound you’re working with. I’m going to begin testing all d8 extracts I come across once the little machine is calibrated and ready to go with d8 and d9 standards from Cayman, along with an HU-331 and exo-THC standard down the line, which brings me to–

  2. HU-331 is a toxic, red, gross compound I used to work with as I was doing oncogenic studies and it’s a relatively cheap topoisomerase II inhibitor (when your DNA replicates, it twists at either end to open up in the middle for DNA polymerase to do it’s thing. This twisting is ‘balanced’ by topoisomerase. Inhibiting this enzyme = double stranded DNA breaks = no bueno).

Question: has anyone looked into reduction byproducts of HU-331? ‘CRC’ for broad spec distillate was simple enough during the column chromatography days by just acidifying the organic phase of the gradient, requiring no media or DCVC. However, I’d like to start a discussion about doing similar things to d8 (diluting in solvent, acidifying solvent to remove red color) but in no way would I endorse this and am really just trying to pry at both what is in this soup of compounds that people are selling as d8, and the mechanisms for turning shit d8 into a safe, consumable product.

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I wasn’t aware of the toxicity of HU-331

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Ditto. I was under the impression that it was a beneficial, anticancer compound.

Poison is in the dose…Inhibiting topoisomerase should slow cancer cells down considerably.

Probably not a good idea to huff it if you don’t need that right there in your lungs though.

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in specific instances, yes, but chemotherapeutic targets are usually chosen for their overexpression + nonlethal in normal cell populations. Ex: it’s easier to target cholesterol receptors, downregulating the mTOR/energetic pathway of cancer cells, than the mTOR pathway itself, and just let the cancer cell run itself into the ground, rather than directly target it with a lethal agent. Drug delivery/nanoparticle systems can get around this by disguising lethal agents as things like cholesterol, targeting receptors, and then the drug itself is only released upon binding to the receptor and diffusing through the membrane. Since certain receptors are overexpressed in cancer, its a way of selective delivery via taking advantage of biology.

Anyways, definitely not a good idea to huff–I know a few private companies were using photoradiation to synthesize it back in 16-17. 2 week process, UV degradation gave about an 8% conversion to HU-331, which I would then purify, emulsify, and use to treat glioblastoma cells in vitro. Worked surprisingly well, some synergy in combination with traditional agents like TMZ.

There’s really not much literature regarding HU-331 spectral analysis or characteristics in general, so I’m interested how the spectrographs look in the darker ‘red’ d8 distillate vs the ‘water clear’ d8 to attempt to see the qualitative ratio of HU-331:d8:CBN, and see if that’s predictive for the quality of the distillate itself.

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I do a lot of colorimetry for other things (Fe, sulphides, polysulfide, range of catyonic dyes) , and got this same idea since a while. We can colaborate. I got a gc and a uv vis spectrophotometer as well. It should work well in ethanol.

And so you confirm hu-331 is the pink/purple thing wich form upom cbd exposure to uvs?

Would love to collaborate. I can share data on this post as I generate it.

I cannot confirm–only that HU-331 has a distinct darker red hue (darker than oxidized terpenes, no purple, etc). First step is procuring some sort of standard and then running that against darker distillates to look for absorbance at that specific wavelength.

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HU-331 elutes at the same retention time as d9 on the popular Shimadzu High Throughput HPLC method. However, the UV spectrum is extremely different than other cannabinoids. I have not been able to identify it in any d8 samples I have seen.