Whats The Science behind "The Cure"
- Thread starter k5kreep
- Start date
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
Imo, afaik ... the principal action/benefit of a good cure is to retain enough moisture for a mild fermentation to take place (reducing sugars, starches and other carriers of harshness) while not retaining enough moisture to promote outright molding or rotting. cn
Thedillestpickle
Well-Known Member
good answer. basically letting the fruit ripen.
JamCE
New Member
This may help your journey down the road into the science realm...just passing this from another post in another thread in this forum.
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?p=3112013#post3112013
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?p=3112013#post3112013
Many people might have made the same mistakes as me. I always come out with neutral smelling bud that doesn't smoke smooth and harsh taste. I think my problem has been beginning the curing process to early so my buds have too high of RH after jarred for 12 hours and then i'll over dry them and try to cure like that. Realizing the low humidity i'll try and put an orange peel to get it in the "curing zone" RH which will indeed get the humidity back up.. but the results are same. SHIT
So basically I think my problem is curing the bud at the wrong moisture content. Either too high or too low humidity. Its hard without knowing from first hand experience what it should look and feel like.
If you buy a hydrometer which i think i'm going to do, you can get it just right by measuring the RH. Lol just saw the post above me with that very same link I read.. /\
So basically I think my problem is curing the bud at the wrong moisture content. Either too high or too low humidity. Its hard without knowing from first hand experience what it should look and feel like.
If you buy a hydrometer which i think i'm going to do, you can get it just right by measuring the RH. Lol just saw the post above me with that very same link I read.. /\
BlazedMonkey
Well-Known Member
^^ You guys he says in his post he has a great curing process he wants to know What happens on a molecular level i believe. From what i understand as water leaves and the starches and sugars break down as well as other molecules that were inactive become active as well as things change into the terpenoids that give weed its smell and effect the high.
Just from what I've read
Just from what I've read
Thedillestpickle
Well-Known Member
from your post it sounds like your far from "perfecting the art" lolYea I know thats why I said the end result was shit nonetheless.. so yea don't try it. I'm working on perfecting the art so bare with me
We do need to get someone with some good science in here though to answer this question properly. I can add a bit of what Ive been reading though. part of the idea with curing is you dont want to have too much chlorophil at the end or your weed will taste like "grass" and smoke harsh. A good cure should break down some of the chlorophyl. you should lose some of the green pigment during cure. starches also need to be converted to sugars, and like blazed monkey said, the plant proccesses that create terpenoids should be allowed to continue to add to the aroma. I dont agree with blazed monkey saying that this occurs as a result of the water evaporating from the bud. evapouration does not cause curing.
One way to think of it is that the plant isnt really dead yet, until you dry it out. When you first harvest the flowers, the enzymes are still active and chemical changes continue to occur until you dry the plant out. If you dont dry it out eventually itll just rot. once the bud is dry the cure is halted. so its a matter of finding the balance. Same goes with Meat, You age a steak to let the enzymes in the meat break itself down. You dont want to wait too long or youll get food poisoning, but if you do it right your steak will be more tender. Im not the scientist this thread needs though, so lets hope our hero comes swooping in with all our answers.
anyone got a PhD in molecular biology?
k0ijn
Scientia Cannabis
I assume drying is already covered and will only explain curing.
Curing takes place from 65% RH to 55% RH.
What you are doing when you cure weed is mainly rehydration. And therefore a "restructuring" if you will, of terpenoids and other substances in the weed.
You are slowly 'pulling' out substances from the buds, letting the buds gradually remoisten and further dry, slowly.
This is a form of ripening of the flowers (buds) and thus you are improving taste and odour by letting a fermentation take place.
Substances (sugars, starches, chlorophyll etc.) break down and allow terpenoids to fully develop.
Brick Top
New Member
What are you actually asking or meaning when you say; "can anybody explain to me the science behind the curing process?"
Do you mean as in what is the best way to cure or as in what occurs during curing?
If you mean what occurs during curing, after cannabis is harvested, during curing, various carboxyl groups begin to degrade, releasing CO[SUB]2[/SUB] and leaving behind the desired decarboxylated active cannabinoids.
Some THC in resin is present in the form THC-A, also called THC acid. This form of THC has a carbonate molecule (COOH) attached to it, which is also called a carboxyl group or acid. THC is only marginally psychoactive when a carboxyl group is attached.
To decarboxylate is to remove the carbonate molecule. This simply means breaking the bond between the COOH molecule and the THC molecule
When the carbonate molecule is removed from THC acid, the COOH evaporates away in the form of water vapor (H2O) and carbon dioxide (CO2), and THC is left behind. Converting THC-A through decarboxyltion improves the available THC content, sometimes called potentiating the THC. The potency is increased because more psychoactive elements are available.
If that is not what you were asking and instead were asking about the best method to accomplish that, sorry, but the above is what I took what you said as asking because there really isn't anything scientific about putting buds in jars, keeping them in a dark place with a moderate temperature and burping them often.
k0ijn
Scientia Cannabis
It's very interesting about the decarboxylation, good stuff
However I wonder how much THC resin is still present in it's pre-cursor THC-A form when most growers harvest with some amber trichomes, mostly cloudy and few clear.
Even a large part harvest with 50% amber 50% cloudy and very few clear.
I realize now that this of course is why cured weed gets better with time, the decarboxylation is vital to this, and even if it's a small amount of clear trichomes there are to work with, it still has the ability to change the final product.
Thedillestpickle
Well-Known Member
Thats was some good science Bricktop, What about the other aspects of the cure? Your also trying to acheive a smoother smoke, and finer flavour. Its not just about the potency.
Brick Top
New Member
Likely more than you would think, and after throwing away THC by letting it oxidize and become CBN, which amber is a sign of, it would still be very important to do all you could so any THCA that remains would become THC.
Brick Top
New Member
I've never researched the chemical changes that occur in terpenoids and carotenoids while curing. I ran across this online book about them (partial book) but I haven't read it yet. You might find something out there, though I do not know if it goes into changes during curing.
http://books.google.ca/books?id=Gr7jDZ8WhVUC&pg=PA1&dq=terpenoids&hl=en&ei=dZbuTJfHNIG4sAPdno2nCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CE4Q6AEwCA#v=onepage&q&f=true
Thedillestpickle
Well-Known Member
I don't think I will be able to read that to be honest lol.
I don't think we need to worry so much about synthesizing terpenoids during the cure, If grown well your bud should be loaded with plently of aroma already. but it may be important to understand the temperatures at which they volatize in order to prevent losing them during curing or drying. I was thinking more about the process in the cure that changes the starches to sugars and the changes of chlorophyl that take place. More thinking about how the harsh qualities are removed rather than how nice terpenoid qualities could be added.
k0ijn
Scientia Cannabis
Yes I know CBN is degraded THC, apparent in amber trichomes.
I agree completely that letting the clear trichomes oxidize and thereby THC-A change into THC will undoubtedly improve the final product.
But the change will likely be larger if you harvest early, than a harvest with just a few % of clear to cloudy & amber trichomes.
