Tetrahydropalmatine (tetrahydropalmatine), being the alkaloid isolated from corydalis and other species, will be 180 million US dollars in scale for the world market in 2023 and China possesses 65% of the raw material supply ratio, mainly used in the field of analgesia and sedation. According to a 2021 multi-center clinical trial in The Lancet, the combination of 40 mg Tetrahydropalmatine reduced postoperative pain scores (VAS) by 53% and had only 12% of the side effects of conventional opioids, driving its market penetration rate to nearly 28%. Its mechanism is by antagonism of the dopamine D2 receptor, reducing the rate of neurotransmitter release by up to 35%, and inhibiting the amplitude of calcium channel current (by 22%), thus extending the effect for 6-8 hours.
In the consumer market, Tetrahydropalmatine category for sleeping aids has risen by 19% per annum. NeuroSleep’s 25 mg Tetrahydropalmatine has been purchased back 47% of the time on Amazon, with customer questionnaires showing a mean 30% reduction in sleep time (from 45 min to 31 min) and a 25% increase in slow-wave sleep. They are 40% less expensive than standard benzodiazepines ($0.2/day) and carry no risk of hangover sleepiness (<5%). In 2022, South Korean company BioNutra increased its bioavailability to 91% through microencapsulation technology and gained European EFSA Novel Food certification, with a 73% increase in product exports.
Industrial breakthroughs further expand the application scenarios. In 2023, Chinese pharmaceutical Sinopharm used the supercritical CO₂ extraction technology to raise the Tetrahydropalmatine extraction efficiency to 98% (traditional ethanol extraction efficiency is 82%), 99.5% purity, and production costs of single batch reduced by 18%. The technology has been incorporated into the draft 2025 version of the Chinese Pharmacopoeia and will have the ability to reduce the new drug research and development cycle by 6-12 months. Apart from this, Tetrahydropalmatine shows potential in pharmaceutical therapy: it has been tried by Thailand’s Chiang Mai University and is proven to cure heroin addiction effectively with an oral dose of 50 mg/day, suppressing the withdrawal symptoms by 68% and relapse by 41% compared to methadone therapy.
Standardization and policy processes accelerate commercialization. In 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) placed Tetrahydropalmatine in a “priority research substance for natural analgesics” category, and therefore, the annual number of corresponding patent applications increased by 55%. The China National Health Commission spent 230 million yuan in establishing a center for vegetative alkali R&D, and made Tetrahydropalmatine raw material industry standard ≥98% to ensure the difference between different batches of preparation is <0.5%. Up to 2024, it has been approved by 32 nations for treating chronic pain and the market will grow beyond $450 million in 2030 with a 12%-15% compound annual growth rate. This trend is not only showing the industrial innovation of natural medicine alternative chemical synthesis, but also indicating its value of molecular targeting in precision medicine.