Imagine you鈥檙e starting your own marijuana farm.
First you get land and water rights. Then you鈥檝e got to find the right strain of cannabis. That can involve as much luck as science.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of legend and laws,鈥� said Mowgli Holmes, the chief scientific officer at Phylos Bioscience.
鈥淚n general it鈥檚 like, 鈥楳y friend Billy gave me this. And he told me that he got it from this guy. And 鈥� this is the original thing. This is the lost cut of Panama Red from so and so in 1978.鈥欌��
Phylos Bioscience is an Oregon startup that, for a few hundred dollars, will outline the genetic profile of any cannabis plant you bring them.
The information is great for growers 鈥� it helps farmers ensure they鈥檙e not going to get sued for infringing on someone else鈥檚 intellectual property.
Growers need that kind of detail, because the cannabis market is a mess. Holmes said medical consumers, for example, can鈥檛 be assured the strain they buy one week will be the same next week.
鈥淭hey find something and it鈥檚 called 鈥楲emon Haze鈥� or whatever. But then they can鈥檛 get it again. They go back and they get something called the same thing, but it鈥檚 not the same thing,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd they can鈥檛 get the same thing anywhere else even though it has the same name because people just rename things, because they don鈥檛 know what they are.鈥�
Phylos is only one of dozens of Oregon startups doing research on marijuana.
鈥淭he numbers we just received by phone says in the last six months there鈥檚 $60 million to $80 million that has gone into startups,鈥� said State Sen. Floyd Prozanski, D-Eugene, who sits on Oregon鈥檚 medical regulation committee.
There are all kinds of different businesses. Some are trying to perfect the process of extracting cannabis oil. Some are developing a dermal patch 鈥� so people can absorb marijuana through their skin. This January, a group of entrepreneurs launched the 鈥淥regon Hub,鈥� a farm and research center in Clackamas County that aims to improve growing techniques by finding ways, for example, to reduce water and energy use.
Seth Crawford and his brother run 鈥淥regon CBD鈥� in the Willamette Valley. They鈥檙e working with industrial hemp, which is federally legal as long as it contains less than 0.3 percent of the active cannabis ingredient, THC.
Their goal is to invigorate America鈥檚 old industrial hemp market by breeding plants to grow in a variety of climates.
鈥淵ou鈥檙e looking at humidity, mold and mildew resistance, a number of different types of potential pathogens that emerge in specific micro-climates that we try to adapt our plants for,鈥� he said.
So there is plenty of marijuana research going on in Oregon. But it鈥檚 startup research 鈥� not the kind of peer-reviewed, double-blind research that鈥檚 going to lead to FDA-approved medications. Thus, the benefits for patients are less direct.
Most FDA-level marijuana science is being conducted overseas. A British company recently developed a cannabis extract called Sativex. It鈥檚 been approved for to help with neuropathic pain in 28 countries 鈥� but not the U.S.
The FDA has also approved another drug called Marinol to treat nausea in cancer patients. It鈥檚 made out of synthetic THC, the compound in marijuana that gets you high.
But marijuana contains a hundred compounds or more, and experts say it鈥檚 the interaction between those compounds that give the plant its medical properties.
The FDA鈥檚 drug approval process doesn鈥檛 deal with so many compounds at one time.
So perhaps the future of Oregon鈥檚 medical marijuana market will be in the form of supplements and 鈥渨hole plant鈥� edibles, rather than new FDA-approved medications.
Copyright 2017 Oregon Public Broadcasting