Hey - i was wondering about this for a while and i dont think anyone has tried it. I would imagine it would need to be done fast as the alkaloids are unstable.

Catha Edulis Extraction - perhaps stb then fasa for cathinone, cathine, cathinene fumarates ?
perhaps a mesc like extraction ?

Please would anyone that has some good chem knowledge let me know what those alkaloids are soluble in ?

This would obviously be done with a fresh pile of khat caus it looses all its actives on drying(like picked the same morning and extracted hastily)

must be some way, can these alkys be stabalized ?

Just how unstable is unstable? Where is the source for stability? There are ways to protect compounds during extractions but that can get fancy and complicated. Sorry don't have much more info now.

hrmm well - khat for consumption must be harvested the same day, second day it is at least half as potent, third day its inactive - this is with them being in the fridge and kept moist. I know nobody has done this but i think it could work well. Are the actives in salt or freebase form in the plant material - which form is more stable fumarates, hydrocloride salt, sulphates ? - should it be done stb - pull with what (xylene/naptha) - then titrate out the salt in the desired form ?

Swim intends to try this next weekend so any hints would help.
Swim will take photos and write up details of how it was done and if successfull, the finished product.

If it remains unstable its fine - it can be used the same day.

One idea may be to take a look at the literature and see how these compounds have been isolated. That could give some clues as to just how stable it is.

Sometimes plant enzymes are still active and degrade compounds or change them so that could be the reason in plant material it doesn't stay active. Especially if the material is fresh. Dried material it may also be inactive because of heat etc who knows.

As far as the stability of the pure compound whats unstable about it? Is it unstable from pH temperature light etc? Those are the kinds of questions one should try to answer before embarking on such an extraction.

SWIM has never researched into this much but thats often the strategy SWIM takes when embarking on chemical purification in the real world with legal compounds.

Hi all
I looked into this some time ago if you search the Nook and the Corroboree for Torsten posts there is some good info .Combining the info from both sites will give you a basic tech.
Very interested in the results
Cheers

Ok I dug this out from the Nook
This is the only info that is near complete that I have found.





Quote
any alkaline extraction will leave you with only cathine and crap.

it has to be an acidic extraction. blend fresh herb with water and ice to a smoothie. put in beaker and add some HCl and stir (to convert the alkaloid organic salts to the hydrochloride). keep agitating until the ice has melted and the soup is pretty much liquid. Strain through cloth then vac filter (diatoms or celite can help if it gets too gluggy). if your soup is likely to get much above 0 degC then stick it in the freezer for a little while. Also put any finished filtrate into the freezer.
Once all of it is done, chill to -10 or lower. Prepare a 5% solution of NaOH and chill to -10.

Now comes the part where you have to be VERY quick. Anything more than 15 minutes between now and when you add the acid and I doubt you would get ANY product.

Add as much NaOH solution as needed to bring filtrate to pH 13. Quickly extract with suitable solvent (note: years ago when I tried this I used ether, which worked extremely well for several reasons. This is simply not readily available anymore. DCM would work from a solubility aspect, but may cause emulsion. Naptha would work, but requires large volumes, Xylene I have no idea, but it's a good bet.)
Once you have all your freebase in solvent, make sure to give it a couple of washes. If you use ether you can now add HCl until pH4 and evaporate the solvent by dipping in hot water bath and blowing air into the top of beaker. Note that the 15 minutes counts to the point where you add the acid!

If using naptha etc you simply add HCl to ph3, then add equal amount (compared with HCl) of water. Separate water layer, extract again with just water, combine water layers. Put a 2mm layer of the water layer in pyrex dish, set up fan to evap solvent residues, then use heatgun or blowheater to direct hot airstream over dish while agitating the material with plastic spatula. Eventually it will crystalise.

Both methods result in a highly acidic hygroscopic mass of crystals or goop which needs to be kept dry.

Once dry simply add enough acetone to cover the crystals in a beaker (or more if it is really dirty), heat acetone to boiling point in hot water bath, let cool for 1 minute, put beaker in sealed zip bag and stick in freezer for 1 hour (depends on volume - contents must get to -5). Vac filter in mini buchner.

You still keen on doing it? Sadly it is illegal now where I am. Let me know how you go, cos so far only one person has been able to copy this successfully.

hrmm - i am amped to try and have nothing to loose - its a protected species here and to buy a bundle is cheap - i dont have access to ether tho - i would be using xylene - i have a seperatory funnel but no vac filter. also a normal freezer will be used - what is the average temp of a cold fridge freezer ?
any mods to that tek to take that into consideration ?

This link also hass an extaction on catha edulis. they extract with methanol, resuspend in acid, basify with sodium bicarbonate(!) and pull with dcm.

Cathinone has an XlogP3 of 1.1 and cathine 0.8. They are slightly polar and may not be pulled succesfully with xylene. limonene could work nicely though.

But in any case, SWIM has never tried the extraction so he won't say more for the moment.

Fumurate salts are extremely stable compounds, if that helps.

okay so xylene is out - damn.
limonene, methanol and ethanol are not available at present.
Acetone, naptha, fumaric acid, sodium carbonate/bicarbonate, anhydrous magnesium sulphate, hydrochloric acid and lye are available.
i know its not much but the enthusiasm and plant material is there. Swim likes working with fasa, any more tips based on what swim has ?

Are there any updates on how this extraction went?.... I'm curious to see the results