[dlntx9]

I am looking for a method to extract THC out of a "energy shot" type of product to analyse via GC-FID.
The product is being legally sold in washington under I-502 guidelines. I've tried a few liquid-liquid methods, but am not recovering anywhere close to what I should be. When testing plant materials I get excellent recovery, but something in this matrix is causing me problems.

Using hexane as my solvent I am recovering ~ 8ug/ml
The manufacture claims that the thc content is 5mg/30 ml or 0.166mg/ml
The ingredients are below
My last approach was as follows

1/2 ml Sx
1/2 ml hexane
vortex
centrifuge
add NaCl
vortex
centrifuge
filter through .45 syringe filter
manually inject into gc

The chromatogram looks nice. Nice background and clean peak.

Proprietary Ingredient Blend: Organic Cane Alcohol, Cannabis, Guarana Seed Powder, Organic Fair Trade Yerbe Matte Leaf, Quercetin from Green Tea

Other Ingredients: Water, Honey, Xylitol , Organic Lemon Extract, Citric Acid, Other Natural Flavors

[Arkcon]

Hmmm... you may need to check research papers what the typical procedures are.  You may also have to develop procedures to extract the active quantitatively, and there are general resources for that.  What you have to consider is that your samples simply don't have the amount of active they claim, or that some component of the matrix is interfering.  You may want to make, or have made for you, a placebo, and then spike it with a carefully measured quantity of active yourself.  Then see if your extraction procedure is adequate.

 It might also be worthwhile, if you can, to develop a more complicated method that quantitates many of the other volatile ingredients.  You wouldn't run that all the time, just when problems show up, so you can check all of their quality control.  That's what I would do with an HPLC method, I don't know if that's really possible with GC.

[n13b]

If you haven't found a solution yet one the chemists I work with may be able to help you out.  They are really good.  The easiest way would be to either send me a message or go to http://gentechscientific.com/contact-us and select customer service.  Or you can message me.