Description

Material identity comes before any procedure

Palmitoylethanolamide is the fatty acid amide formed between palmitic acid and ethanolamine, systematically named N-(2-hydroxyethyl)hexadecanamide. Its registry number is 544-31-0, the molecular formula C18H37NO2 and the formula weight 299.49 g/mol. Structurally it is a sixteen-carbon saturated chain terminating in a secondary amide that bears a free hydroxyl group. That combination of a long lipophilic tail with a small polar head dictates everything from how the solid wets to how it is weighed. See also our laboratory reagent: CBD / Cannabidiol / Kannabidiol, Kryszały ≥ 99.85%.

Intake protocol for a delivered batch

Record the consignment against the order: substance name, registry number, lot identifier, quantity and the certificate of analysis supplied with it.
Inspect the outer packaging and the inner seal before opening anything. A compromised seal on a lipophilic amide means moisture ingress and probable caking.
Let the sealed container equilibrate to room temperature. Opening a cold container in a warm room condenses water directly onto the solid.
Check appearance against the certificate — a white to off-white crystalline or waxy solid, free of discolouration and of hard aggregates.
Subsample in a low-humidity area, with a clean spatula and a receiving container that will never be reused for another lot.
Label the working container with substance, lot, opening date and the initials of the person who opened it.
Return the master container to sealed, cool, dark storage with headspace kept small, under an inert gas blanket if the lot will stay in service for a long period.
Re-confirm identity before any critical work if the container has been open for an extended time.

Why the order of these steps matters

Steps three and five exist for one reason: water. The amide bond is stable in the dry solid, but adsorbed moisture pushes the slow hydrolysis back toward palmitic acid and ethanolamine, and it turns a free-flowing powder into an aggregate that no longer disperses reproducibly. Neither change is visible until a weighing goes wrong.

Dissolution and analytical notes

The sixteen-carbon chain makes this material essentially insoluble in water and readily soluble in warm ethanol, in dimethyl sulfoxide and in chlorinated solvents. Gentle warming with mixing is normal practice; overheating is not, because material driven to melt and re-solidify can adopt a different crystal habit with different dispersion behaviour. Micronised and non-micronised grades of the same substance differ only in particle size distribution, yet they behave as different materials in any suspension work, so the grade belongs in the record alongside the lot number. See also our laboratory reagent: Phénylpiracétam/Phénylpiracétam, Pureté ≥ 99%, 100.

Storage in one line

Dry, sealed, cool, dark, minimal headspace, and a written note of when the seal was broken.

Related reagents

Selected literature

Animal and in vitro studies indexed in PubMed; no human-use guidance is provided here.

Wang Y Palmitoylethanolamide in the Treatment of Pain and Its Clinical Application Prospects 2025, Drug design, development and therapy. PMID 40827226
Assogna M Synaptic Effects of Palmitoylethanolamide in Neurodegenerative Disorders 2022, Biomolecules. PMID 36009055
Lama A Palmitoylethanolamide dampens neuroinflammation and anxiety-like behavior in obese mice 2022, Brain, behavior, and immunity. PMID 35176443
Valenza M Palmitoylethanolamide and White Matter Lesions: Evidence for Therapeutic Implications 2022, Biomolecules. PMID 36139030

Handling qualification. This product must not be used in humans in any form. Beyond human use, animal use is also excluded. A high-purity laboratory product used in HPLC and GC-MS studies. It is neither a medicinal product nor a foodstuff.

Additional information

Weight	N/A
Mass	1g, 2g, 3g, 4g, 5g, 10g, 20g, 40g, 80g, 100g, 200g, 500g, 1kg