# An Optimized Terpene Profile for a New Medical Cannabis Oil
## 3 Results
### Cannabinoids in Medical Cannabis Oils  
Concentrations of CBD, CBDA, CBN, \(\Delta\)9-THC, and \(\Delta\)9-THCA in MCO preparations are reported in Table 7. A representative HPLC-ESI-MS/MS chromatogram of a standard calibration point for the analytes is shown in Figure 1. Cannabinoids amounts were found in line with data available in the literature for Bedrocan(r) fios preparations [30; 31; 32].  
\begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**Compound**} & \multirow{2}{*}{**Overall**} & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**MCO-1**} & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**MCO-2**} & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**MCO-3**} \\  & & & **SIFAP** & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**CAIV1**} & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**CERFIT**} \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**mg/mL**} & **Mean** & **Median** & **Mean** & **Median** & **Mean** & **Median** & **Mean** & **Median** & **F Test** & **Chi2 Test** \\  & **(SD)** & **(Min-Max)** & **(SD)** & **(Min-Max)** & **Mean** & **(Min-Max)** & **(SD)** & **(Min-Max)** & **\(p\) Value** \({}^{*}\) & **\(p\) Value** \({}^{*}\) \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**CBDA**} & 0.04 & 0.03 & 0.03 & 0.00 \({}^{4}\) & 0.07 & 0.08 \({}^{*}\) & 0.03 & 0.03 \({}^{4}\) & 2.70 & 8.13 \\  & (0.05) & (0.00-0.20) & (0.67) & (0.00–0.20) & (0.03) & (0.03-0.10) & (0.03) & (0.00–0.10) & 0.0854 & 0.0172 \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**CBD**} & 0.03 & 0.02 & & & & & & & & \\  & (0.04) & (0.00–0.13) & \multirow{2}{*}{NQ} & \multirow{2}{*}{NQ} & \multirow{2}{*}{NQ} & 0.03 & 0.02 & 0.06 & 0.05 & 2.92 & 3.86 \\  & (0.03) & (0.00–0.13) & & & & & & & & \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**CBN**} & 0.29 & 0.17 & 0.18 \({}^{*}\) & 0.18 \({}^{*}\) & 0.17 \({}^{*}\) & 0.14 & 0.53 \({}^{*}\) & 0.58 & 4.33 & 1.62 \\  & (0.35) & (0.02–1.06) & (0.01) & (0.16–0.19) & (0.14) & (0.04–0.54) & (0.53) & (0.02–1.06) & 0.0234 & 0.4447 \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**\(\Delta\)9-THC**} & 0.11 & 0.00 & 0.03 & 0.00 \({}^{4}\) & 0.14 & 0.01 \({}^{4}\) & 0.17 & 0.15 \({}^{*}\) & 1.84 & 3.42 \\  & (0.18) & (0.00–0.70) & (0.67) & (0.00–0.20) & (0.23) & (0.00–0.70) & (0.18) & (0.00–0.50) & 0.1789 & 0.1809 \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{**\(\Delta\)9-THC**} & 20.58 & 19.77 & 22.42 \({}^{*}\) & 22.82 \({}^{4}\) & 18.80 \({}^{*}\) & 19.00 \({}^{*}\) & 20.52 \({}^{*}\) & 19.82 \({}^{*}\) & 20.32 & 16.91 \\  & (1.94) & (17.99–23.87) & (1.11) & (19.37–23.11) & (0.72) & (17.99–20.13) & (1.75) & (18.90–23.87) & 0.0001 & 0.0002 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table}
Table 7: Cannabinoids (mg/mL) in MC extracts. Data from ten separate experiments each performed in triplicate. Tukey-Kramer (for One-Way ANOVA) or Dunn (for Kruskal-Wallis test) post-hoc analyses were applied. Differences were considered significant when \(p<0.05\) and are indicated with different superscripts letters: in each line, values with a different letter (a, b or c for mean values; d, e or f for median values) are significantly different (\(p<0.05\)).  
Figure 1: HPLC-MS/MS mass chromatogram of a standard calibration point for analytes involved in the study.  
Neutral psychoactive A9-THC concentration was high and consistent through all Cannabis oils (18.0-23.9 mg/mL), conversely its acidic precursor A9-THCA was under-represented (0.0-0.7 mg/mL) depending on the presence of a decarboxylation step (Figure 2a). The comparison of the 3 MCOs showed that MCO-1 had 9% of A9-THC more and 18% less of A9-THCA than MCO-2 and MCO-3.  
SIFAP method failed to extract CBD and its acid precursor CBDA that were slightly recovered with the two other procedures (0-0.13 and 0-0.20 mg/mL, respectively). CBN, analysed to monitor eventual degradation/oxidation of Cannabis oils [33], was present in low amount (<0.20 mg/mL) in MCO1 and 2, while MCO3 showed a higher range (0.02-1.06 mg/mL) than the others (Figure 2b).  
Overall, the three methods performed similarly in terms of final quantitative yield of extracted cannabinoids.