Various Drugs
What Is TMA (trimethoxyamphetamine)
TMA can be described as an amphetamine hallucinogen (as is MDMA, commonly know as ecstasy).
The effects with doses under 200mg have been described as:
Feelings of euphoria, pleasure, empathy and sociability, as well as confusion, depression, sleep problems, anxiety, panic attacks, blurred vision, nausea, tensing of neck and jaw muscles, teeth clenching, faintness, chills, sweating and increased heart rate and blood pressure. The body may feel light, heavy or distorted.
Distortion in perception, thinking and memory, hallucinations, paranoia, psychosis and in some users anxiety and depression. Produces a sense of well-being, heightened tactile sensations and emotions. Pupils dilate, nose and throat become dry. Overdose can cause death.
The effects with doses over 200mg have been described as:
Emotionally quite volatile, sometimes gentle and peaceful, sometimes irritable, while being able to focus on external visual and audible events. See the bottom of this page for more about the effects of TMA, by the author of most of the text on this page, Alexander Shulgin.
From PIHKAL: A Chemical Love Story by Alexander Shulgin.
TMA was the very first totally synthetic psychedelic phenethylamine that found to be active in man. This report was from research done in Canada, and it appeared in 1955. There was an earlier report on TMPEA, but there were few details.
The Canadian studies with TMA involved the use of a strobe light as a tool for the induction of visual phenomena. These experiments used levels in the 50-150 milligram range, and generally employed pre-treatment with Dramamine for the successful prevention of nausea.
There was reported giddiness and light-headedness, and some remarkable flash-induced visualizations. With higher levels, the visual syntheses are present without external stimulation.
But there is a thread of negativity that seems to pervade the experience at these higher levels, and the appearance of a publication that emphasized the possible antisocial nature to TMA seemed to discourage further medical exploration.
Military interest was maintained however, apparently, as TMA became a part of the chemical warfare studies where it was referred to with the code name EA-1319.
It had been used in human trials with psychiatric patients, but no details of these experiments have been published.
The presence of a potentially active impurity in TMA deserves some comment. In the Canadian work, the material used was described as melting at 219-220 °C, which is the property given for the impurity-free material above.
If this was the actual material used in those studies, this impurity (3,5-dimethoxy-4-hydroxyamphetamine) was probably not present. The Army studies use a material of unreported melting point.
In my own studies, the lower melting product was used. There is an intriguing and unanswered question: what contribution did this phenolic component make to the nature of the observed effects of TMA?
There is an old saying that has gotten many people into trouble: 'If one is good, then two is better.' And if a statement of the measure of worth of a compound can be made from its potency, then TMA is a step in the right direction. And this was a chemically simple direction to follow further.
Looking at mescaline as a compound with no carbons on its side-chain, and TMA as a mescaline molecule with one carbon on its side chain, then what about a compound with two carbons there, or three, or nine carbons?
Elsewhere, I have made comparisons between myristicin and MMDA, and between safrole and MDA. And here there is a similar parallel between elemicin and TMA.
What are these relationships between the essential oils and the amphetamines? In a word, there are some ten essential oils that have a three carbon chain, and each lacks only a molecule of ammonia to become an amphetamine.
So, maybe these essential oils, or 'almost' amphetamines, can serve as an index for the corresponding real amphetamine counterparts. I had originally called this family the 'natural' amphetamines, but my son suggested calling them the 'essential' amphetamines, and I like that.
At the time that I had synthesized TMA, back there in the '50s, I had the impulse to explore this body of Essential Amphetamines. As the old folk-wisdom says: 'Nature is trying to tell us something.'
One of the banes of the archivist is having to choose one pattern of organization over another. The book store owned by a language scholar will have the German poets and playwrights and novelists here, and the French ones over there.
Next door, the book store is run by a letters scholar, and the poetry of the world is here, and the plays of the world are there, regardless of the language of origin. The same obtains with spices, and essential oils, and amphetamines.
The spice cabinet is a rich source of chemical treasures, each source plant containing a host of com-pounds, some of which are true essential oils. And the next spice from the next plant has some of the same components and some new ones.
One must remember that the term 'essential' has nothing to do with the meaning of needed, or required. The word's origin is essence, something with an odor or smell.
Thus, the essential oils are those oils that have a fragrance, and the Essential Amphetamines are those compounds that can, in principle, be made from them by the addition of ammonia in the body.
There were a few interesting experimental trials that were based on these natural oils. Methoxyeugenol was assayed up to a 10 milligram level, and asarone at up to a 70 milligram level, and neither had any effects at all.
And, in an attempt to challenge the 'oil-to-amphetamine' concept, I made up a mixture of 1 part MDA, 2 parts TMA and 5 parts MMDA.
A total of 100 milligrams of this combination (which I had named the 'Pseunut Cocktail' for pseudo-nutmeg) should be equivalent to the safrole, elemicin and myristicin that would be in 5 grams of nutmeg.
And 100 milligrams indeed produced quite a sparkle and considerable eye-dilation. But then, I have never taken 5 grams of nutmeg, so I cannot make any comparisons.
The Authors Experiences With TMA
Dosage: 100-250 mg.
Duration: 6-8 hours
(with 135 mg) I had no nausea, although I always vomit with mescaline. Somehow personality was divided and exposed, and this allowed me to understand my psychic structure more clearly.
But maybe others could look in there, too. The psychiatric use of this drug would be interesting to pursue. It not completely pleasant, maybe because of this personal intimacy.
(with 140 mg) There were not the color changes of mescaline there, but certainly a good humor and over-appreciation of jokes.
The images behind the eyes were remarkable and tied in with the music, and I became annoyed at other people's conversations that got in the way. I was out of it in eight hours.
I would compare this to 300 or 350 milligrams of mescaline and I rather think that I would prefer the mescaline.
(with 225 mg) There was quite a bit of nausea in the first hour. Then I found myself becoming emotionally quite volatile, sometimes gentle and peaceful, sometimes irritable and pugnacious.
It was a day to be connected in one way or another with music. I was reading Bernstein's 'Joy of Music' and every phrase was audible to me.
On radio, Rachmaninoff's 2nd piano concerto on the radio put me in an eyes-closed fetal position and I was involved with the structure of the music.
I was suspended, inverted, held by fine strands of the music which had been woven from the arpeggios and knotted with the chords.
The commercials that followed were irritating, Slaughter on Fifth Avenue, made me quite violent. I was told that I had a, 'Don't cross me if you know what is good for you,' look to me. I easily crushed a rose, although it had been a thing of beauty.
Books PIHKAL:
A Chemical Love Story
The first part of this 1000 page book contains autobiographical accounts of the authors life history and experiments with psychoactive drugs.
The second half is about synthesis, effects, dosages, etc of hundreds of compounds in the phenethylamine family (mescaline, ecstasy, DOM, etc). Get this if you have any interest in the synthesis or effects of nearly any mind expanding drug.
Contains over 20 pages of information about the effects and synthesis TMA and its analogs.
PIHKAL: A Chemical Love Story
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