Researchers Discover How to Produce Medication Created from Cannabis While Reducing the Side Effects

Medical cannabis is improving the quality of life of many ill people: cannabis extracts are used to improve the situation of some children with epilepsy as they reduce the number of attacks suffered.

Despite this, one of the limitations of the medical use of cannabis sativa derivatives is the psychoactive effects that cause alterations on a cognitive level. Now, a research study by Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona published in “PloS Biology” has managed to differentiate the positive consequences of cannabinoids on health, which will make it possible to design new medicines that are more beneficial.

The study, led by Rafael Maldonado, head of the Neuropharmacology Lab in the Department of Experimental Sciences and Health at Pompeu Fabra University, shows that the molecules responsible for the psychoactive effects of cannabinoids, CB1 receptors, form heteromers. “These heteromers are responsible for some of the psychoactive effects of the cannabinoids and, more specifically, for cognitive changes, anxiety, and effects linked to social behaviour that are caused by these psychoactive substances”, explained Maldonado.

On the other hand, monomeric CB1 receptors are responsible for the medical effects of cannabinoids, for example their analgesic properties. Therefore, if molecules are used to dissociate monomerics from heteromers, it is possible to isolate the positive effects of cannabis. In this manner, the study shows that it is possible to obtain analgesic responses and at the same time, avoid negative consequences on our memory.

The discovery, as Maldonado himself has stated, “opens up new possibilities in terms of designing pharmacological tools” for the medical use of cannabinoids that can avoid the “main psychoactive adverse effects of the substances”.