Ledger of the Trichome

Cannabinoids, their mechanisms, and the company they keep

The lock:

When signals flood a listening cell, it brews

A lipid courier and sends the news

Backward across the gap: hold back. The pair -

Anandamide (named bliss) and 2-AG—share

The duty; enzymes clip each note when done.

The hemp’s whole pharmacy is a pun on one.

CBG:

One parent acid, pale and spare,

Feeds every gland; the genes declare

Which blade will carve it. Left alone

And warmed, it’s CBG, whose tone

Is mild: it nudges α-2 to ease

The eye’s slow pressure, then to freeze

MRSA in dishes; and in a mouse

With Huntington’s, props up each neuron’s house.

THCA:

Uncooked, the acid keeps its head:

No CB1 grip, no altered hour,

Yet inflammation, in the dish, has fled,

And rodents’ queasy bellies lose their power.

THC:

THC, the key that turns halfway,

Fits CB1 where the loud circuits play:

It hushes nerves that broadcast pain,

Revives the appetite’s refrain,

Quiets the gut’s rebellious heave,

And hands the sleepless a reprieve,

While dopamine’s low tide is nudged to rise

Until a flattened mood gets back its eyes.

CBD:

CBD won’t touch the front door’s key;

It leans on CB1’s flank, and so

Loosens THC’s grip: the head stays free

Of edges that a sharper dose would show.

It stalls the shears, so native brakes

Hold longer; through serotonin’s 1A it makes

Fear stand down; and Dravet’s storms, in trials, break

On doses that a child can take.

CBC:

CBC, the quiet third, declines

CB1 outright; along the lines

Of TRPA1 it soothes the sting,

And lets the seed-cells of neurons spring;

And mice in tests of sunk resolve

Swim longer; humans still must solve.

CBN:

CBN, from THC that age has worn,

Grips CB1 and CB2 with a lighter clutch;

Its name for easing sleep is widely borne,

Though trial proof has yet to say so much.

THCV:

THCV, sativa’s lean-bodied cousin,

Shuts CB1 at small doses, so the plate

Stays clean where THC would call a dozen

Snacks; type-2 patients saw their glucose rates

Improve in trial. Raise the dose, it turns

To agonist: a clear, brief peak that burns

Out early.

CBDV:

CBDV wears a propyl tail

Where CBD’s is pentyl; on the frail

TRPV1 channel it eases overdrive,

And slows DAGL’s mill, so calmer circuits arrive.

The entourage:

Myrcene, of mango rind and hop,

May ease the blood-brain barrier’s stop,

A claim still argued; less in doubt, the way

It slackens muscle at the end of day.

Pinene, from the forest floor,

Keeps acetylcholine’s score

From being clipped, so memory’s page

Stays legible when THC’s on stage.

Caryophyllene, from the peppercorn’s heat,

Steps onto CB2, and its feat

Is easing inflammation with no high:

A spice-rack key that immune cells try.

Limonene’s rind lends serotonin more to say,

While linalool, from lavender, lets GABA’s calm hold sway.

Cannflavins, pigments of the leaf,

Clamp prostaglandin, bringing relief:

In a dish, thirtyfold aspirin’s strength; the rest

Is human trials, waiting for the test.

The claim, kept honest

Call it the entourage: in ninety-eight

Mechoulam’s lab supplied the name; the weight

Of Russo’s later review said

Whole extracts sometimes outrun the single thread.

Some of it’s proven (CBD gentling THC’s hook);

Some rests on hope. The ledger keeps both, each in its own book.

Much of the mechanistic detail here comes from cell and animal studies; human evidence varies by compound.