Speaking of natural plant compounds inducing alkaloid production, it is possible to do this method using a solid media.  The technical term is "solid state fermentation".  You still have similar aeration requirements and the yield per volume is not as good but this should be explored further.

http://horizon.documentation.ird.fr/exl-doc/pleins_textes/pleins_textes_6/b_fdi_33-34/39186.pdf

aniracetam: have you thought of doing a microhydrolysis and measuring the precipitated LA and/or ammonia released via titration?  there is a lot of stuff in current literature on hydrolysis in tiny sample volumes for analysis.


So Garcinol is around 5-10$ per milligram, the study calls for 50uM in the culture media.  This makes it 30mg per liter to match those concentrations....

Also there is the extraction route:
US Patent 7,063,861

(a) extracting the fresh fruits of Garcinia with 8 to 1 5 parts of C1 to C6 alcohol (e.g. methanol, ethanol, isopropyl alcohol) by refluxing and circulating in a closed reactor until extraction is completed; (b) filtering the extracted material from the spent material; (c) concentrating the extracted material to 1/4 1/6 its volume under vacuum at 540 to 600 mm/Hg; (d) chilling the concentrate for approx. 20 to 30 hours at -5 to 5.degree. C. and filtering the precipitated material in a Nutsche filter; (e) obtaining a solid residue (yield 2.5 to 4%) comprising crude Garcinol (Assay 16 20%). (f) dissolving crude Garcinol extract in a hydrocarbon solvent such as petroleum ether, hexane or toluene (3 to 8 parts), and extracting/partitioning with a high polar, non-miscible solvent such as acetonitrile (2 to 4 parts, 3 to 5 times); (g) separating and concentrating the polar solvent layer to 1/4 1/6 its volume, and chilling at -5 to 8.degree. C. for 12 to 16 hours; (h) filtering and washing the residue with the polar solvent to obtain yellow Garcinol (yield=0.8 to 1.5%, Assay 55 to 70%)

At those yields 1 kg of fruit material should provide enough Garcinol for 20-30L, now we are getting realistic.  Also I bet commercial Garcinia extracts are mostly alcohol extracts, so you can skip to step D, or maybe skip to step F if they precipitated it and redissolved it in water before they sold it.

Yes... I saw the high prices and decided to look at other compounds that are HATi's as well in hopes there were some good ones. NOT sure if curcumin works at all but EGCG is also an option along side many others... I can't imagine why wound HATi would work, while the other one one not?

No idea as I do not know their effectiveness per weight, let alone how easily one or another gets into the cell.

It just needs to be tried, I guess. Perhaps Tween should be added in order to increase the cells permeability?

I know garcinol is preferred to curcumin in these types of experiments because garcinol is much more soluble and mobile through the cell membrane.  The question is will curcumin work well enough?  The good news is that if its added before autoclaving you dont have to worry about solubility in the solution, the heat will dissolve it and it will not crash out.  As far as its mobility in cells I guess many different concentrations should be tried, assuming a higher concentration of curcumin will be required for these reasons.  Tween will most def. help.

After trying to purify some tumeric extract from the health food store I have to warn future bees that this is not the route to go.  Hardly soluble in water, hard to filter, stains everything. 

After Tsat's look at anacardic acid it seems that garcinol is the way to go.  When looking at literature remember that it was often called camboginol.  Unfortunately many commercial extracts from garcinia sp. are mostly salted out hydroxycitric acid instead of garcinol.

Do you guys think DMSO could replace acetonitrile in the above patent?