New Insights into the Chemical Composition of Ayahuasca

Overview

Journal ACS Omega

Publisher American Chemical Society

Specialty Chemistry

Date 2022 Apr 22

PMID 35449956

Authors

Luisina Rodriguez

Andres Lopez

Guillermo Moyna

Gustavo A Seoane

Danilo Davyt

Alvaro Vazquez

Gonzalo Hernandez

Ignacio Carrera

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Ayahuasca is a psychedelic beverage originally from the Amazon rainforest used in different shamanic settings for medicinal, spiritual, and cultural purposes. It is prepared by boiling in water an admixture of the Amazonian vine , which is a source of β-carboline alkaloids, with plants containing -dimethyltryptamine, usually . While previous studies have focused on the detection and quantification of the alkaloids present in the drink, less attention has been given to other nonalkaloid components or the composition of the solids suspended in the beverage, which may also affect its psychoactive properties. In this study, we used nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) to study the composition of ayahuasca samples, to determine their alkaloid qualitative and quantitative profiles, as well as other major soluble and nonsoluble components. For the first time, fructose was detected as a major component of the samples, while harmine (a β-carboline previously described as an abundant alkaloid in ayahuasca) was found to be present in the solids suspended in the beverage. In addition, -dimethyltryptamine (DMT), harmine, tetrahydroharmine, harmaline, and harmol were identified as the major alkaloids present in extracts of all samples. Finally, a novel, easy, and fast method using quantitative NMR was developed and validated to simultaneously quantify the content of these alkaloids found in each ayahuasca sample.

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