Freebase DMT N-oxide is somewhat of a pain to deal with. It’s a yellow oil that won’t crystallize. It can form after extraction and is often present in large amounts in the plant prior to extraction.

According to several sources, DMT N-oxide becomes DMT when vaporized. But some users say the effects are slightly different, so it could be that some of the DMT N-oxide vaporizes without conversion to DMT.

DMT N-oxide is insoluble in naphtha (or heptane), but soluble in water, ether, DCM, etc. If you’re plant material is old, chances are most of the DMT has oxidized into DMT N-oxide. If you’re using naphtha or heptane to extract the DMT, your yield will be very low because it won’t extract much DMT N-oxide.

Let’s say for example that chacruna leaves are used. This sometimes has lots of DMT N-oxide present. For example, in one case the alkaloid mix was 89% DMT-N-oxide and almost no DMT at all. If extracted using a naphtha based A/B extraction, you’ll end up with almost no DMT at all. The DMT-N-oxide would stay in the aqueous phase. In this case you want to either convert it back into DMT or extract it using a solvent like ether or DCM instead of naphtha.

To convert any N-oxide (such as DMT N-oxide) back into its parent freebase alkaloid, you mix it which water made pH 3 (by adding HCl acid, acetic acid, etc.) and excess zinc dust. Mix it continuously for up to 2 hours at room temperature for the conversion to be complete. The remaining zinc dust is filtered off. The pH is then adjusted to pH 9, and the freebase alkaloid is then extracted with a non-polar solvent leaving behind zinc hydroxide in the aqueous phase.

This DMT N-oxide to freebase DMT trick should be part of the initial extraction. After acidifying your extract, before doing a freebase extraction, simple add a lot of excess zinc dust and mix it for 2 hours. Then freebase your DMT and extract it into naphtha. This will greatly increase yields for most plants that contain large amounts of DMT N-oxide that would otherwise be lost in naphtha based extractions.

DMT N-oxide tends to form from DMT when exposed to air drying by a fan, especially in elevated heat. This will make your DMT yellowish and oily. If enough DMT N-oxide is present, you won’t be able to crystallize your DMT unless you freeze precipitate it in naphtha. Dissolving a mix of dry DMT and oily DMT N-oxide in a small amount of warm naphtha will cause the DMT N-oxide to sink to the bottom of the naphtha as yellow or brownish sticky goo. Mix the goo around in the naphtha to free the DMT from it. The DMT will dissolve in the naphtha and can be poured off with the naphtha, leaving behind the DMT N-oxide. Then the DMT can be placed in the freezer to crystallize in the naphtha. Don’t discard the DMT N-oxide goo! You can convert it back into DMT later once you get some zinc dust.

Sound almost to good to be true... but if true this is indeed a revolution in extractions for a maximum yield and also a way to convert goo in something more pleasant to smoke. Can't wait to search where to find zinc dust...

Look it up on Google. N-Oxide reduction with zinc dust is a common lab procedure that is documented all over the place. I’ve seen it used with DMT N-Oxide in a few research documents and it works without a doubt.

Do a search for “zinc elemental powder”, "zinc metal dust" or “zinc dust”, you’ll find many suppliers.

Food grade or USP grade zinc dust is hard to get unless you get it from a chemical supply store. If anyone knows where to get food grade or USP grade zinc dust (this is pure zinc, not zinc sulfate or another form of zinc) from a non-chemical supply store, please PM me. SWIM is very interested in getting more without going to a chemical supply store.

wow, that whole post is the best explanation that i have heard!

ive gotten the yellow oil to solidify by partially redissolving and reevaping in bestine though, does that effect make sense?

In your case it sounds like just DMT that didn't crystallize properly. Impure DMT can appear yellowish and be hard to crystallize and appear oily on its own, and what you did could help crystallize it. So maybe that's just impure DMT with some actual oils and other plant matter in it. DMT N-Oxide won't crystallize and won't dissolve in bestine.

You’ll know if it’s present because when you dissolve it in bestine, the N-Oxide falls to the bottom of the solvent as sticky yellow or brown goo. Did that happen? If so, that was most likely DMT N-Oxide.

DMT N-Oxide is active on its own so don't discard it. You can turn it back into DMT with zinc dust and acetic acid, or use it as is. SWIM often mixes the oily DMT N-Oxide with calcium carbonate to make it dry and smokes it as is.

If it's just impure DMT, the best thing to do is to freeze precipitate it from naphtha/heptane to purify it.

Sometimes it can take several days for even pure DMT to crystallize at room temperature. DMT crystallizes better in cold temperatures. The colder, the better. SWIM has seen pretty pure DMT oil that didn’t crystallize for many days that crystallized overnight in the refrigerator.

According to all the sources that I’ve read DMT N-Oxide won’t crystallize at all, no matter what.

Dude, thanks for the awesome post! And welcome to the forum!

So does that mean that what we've been thinking of as jungle spice is dmt n-oxide? Swim had been thinking it was the degredation product of yuremamine... perhaps it's some of both? The jungle spice swim's friend gave him recently is pure red, that implies something besides n-oxide, if n-oxide yellow or brown. And this jungle was re-acidified, and re=basified, so it's not plant oils or tannins or anything giving it the red color... and it's definately not bestine-soluble.

Guess the true test would be to zinc-ify it and see what happens.

I don't think "jungle spice" is DMT n-oxide. I haven't heard of DMT n-oxide being much more potent than DMT. And DMT n-oxide is definitely not red and, as you mentioned, "jungle spice" is usually described as being red.

SWIM extracted something very much like "jungle spice" from Diplopterys cabrerana a few times. It was present along with the DMT after SWIM removed the 5-MeO-DMT. It was really strong, as strong as 5-MeO-DMT but very different. It's sort of like a cross between DMT and savinorin A. It's quite pleasant at 5 mg vaporized but scary as hell at 15 mg.

"Jungle spice" is more of a mystery than DMT n-oxide. The psychedelic activity of DMT N-Oxide has been known for quite a long time, but there are few actual reports of its effects.

Freebase DMT can easily be turned into DMT N-Oxide by mixing it with an aqueous solution of hydrogen peroxide. So you can easily test the effects of DMT N-Oxide by specifically creating it from freebase DMT. And then you can mix DMT N-Oxide with zinc dust and acetic acid to turn it into DMT acetate, freebase it and then it’s back into freebase DMT again.

Are there many of you out there that have tried isolated DMT N-Oxide?



Here's a clip about this process from "Trout’s Notes on the Genus Desmodium" page 10

Is pure zinc needed or can a zinc salt be used instead?

Does any zinc or zinc salts end up in the final product?

Can you elaborate a bit more please ? what % of each ? You mean calcium carbonate in powder form ? Smoking calcium carbonate is not problematic ?

Good questions.

A 9:1 ratio of powdered calcium carbonate (available at health food and vitamin shops) to DMT N-Oxide is slightly more than enough. First weigh your DMT N-Oxide. Then weigh out 9 times that in calcium carbonate. Dissolve the DMT N-Oxide in acetone and mix it with the calcium carbonate. The calcium carbonate should be just slightly covered in acetone. If not, add more acetone. Mix it well. Then let it completely dry while mixing occasionally. Once dry thoroughly mix it again to make sure it’s all evenly distributed. The calcium carbonate keeps it dry for a long time. It seems to extend the shelf life too. Because a 9:1 ratio is used, 100 mg of the mix would equal 90 mg of calcium carbonate and 10 mg of DMT N-Oxide, making it very easy to measure out doses. You simply multiply your normal dose by 10. So a 20 mg dose would be 200 mg. It’s very convenient.

You can’t smoke calcium carbonate. It won’t vaporize. First all the DMT N-Oxide will vaporize at something like 80 °C. If you keep the flame to it long after all the DMT N-Oxide vaporizes, then eventually the calcium carbonate will decompose at 825 °C and above into calcium oxide and carbon dioxide. A can of soda has many times more carbon dioxide gas coming out of it than the small amount of calcium carbonate used. And there’s so much carbon dioxide present in the air we breathe that the tiny amount released by the little bit of calcium carbonate isn’t going to amount to much. After the carbon dioxide is released, the calcium oxide left will not vaporize. Calcium oxide has a boiling point of 2850 C. That’s really high. To give you an idea of how high that is, here’s some common temperatures of various types of fire:

Oxyhydrogen flame: 2000 °C or above (3645 °F)
Bunsen burner flame: 1300 to 1600 °C (2372 to 2912 °F)
Blowtorch flame: 1,300 °C (2372 °F)
Candle flame: 1000 °C (1832 °F)

SWIM uses a test tube vaporizer, so it all stays at the bottom of the test tube and vaporizes very nicely.

This might not work so well in a normal pipe because the material is very dry and powdery and might fall through the wire mesh screen of a pipe and get inhaled as powder. SWIM doesn’t know. SWIM never uses a regular pipe.

Has anyone tried this type of thing with a regular pipe?

I don't know. I've never seen any references using a zinc salt.

SWIM has read about ascorbic acid (vitamin C) being used instead of zinc. Like zinc, ascorbic acid is a reducing agent that can pull oxygen off of some molecules. I don’t think it’s as strong as zinc, but I don’t think you need a very strong reducing agent to remove the N Oxide. Maybe I’m wrong.

SWIM tried ascorbic acid in place of zinc and it seemed to work very well. SWIM needs to try it again just to make sure it wasn’t a fluke.



According to the several references I’ve seen, there shouldn’t be any zinc left (if pure zinc is used). After this process you’re left with freebase DMT in the non-polar solvent, while the zinc oxide and zinc hydroxide remain in the polar solvent.

SWIM really wants to explore the possibility of using ascorbic acid instead. SWIM doesn’t mind traces of ascorbic acid in his final product. The idea of having traces of zinc oxide and zinc hydroxide in his final product is a little worrisome.

Thanks for the explanations. I wonder how the effects of that carbonate stuff may differs from regular DMT

It doesn't differ at all. The calcium carbonate just keeps it in powder form. There's no chemical reaction between the calcium carbonate and the DMT N-Oxide.

This is all some really good news for my friend who has been saving his yellow cleanup leftovers for years.

Great info, thanks.



Wouldn't jungle spice contain n-oxide though?
I'm assuming that n-oxide is soluable in xylene or toluene of course.

“Jungle spice” could be a mix of DMT N-Oxide and some red beta carboline. I’ve heard of that being a possibility.

I haven’t seen any references with a good solubility profile for DMT N-Oxide. The references I’ve seen only mention that it is soluble in water and insoluble in petroleum ether (VM&P Naphtha). So maybe it’s soluble in xylene or toluene as well. SWIM doesn’t have xylene at the moment and can’t get toluene to test with. SWIM doesn’t like the very strong smell of xylene so he almost never uses it anymore, so SWIM can’t comment on the solubility in xylene or toluene as of yet.

According to SWIM’s limited tests it seems to be soluble in DCM (dichloromethane), acetone, and isopropanol. This needs to be verified by making DMT N-Oxide from pure white DMT crystals (from Chacruna) via hydrogen peroxide and then testing its solubility. After SWIM makes some pure DMT N-Oxide, he can easily test it’s solubility in all the solvents he has easy access to (DCM, acetone, isopropanol, methyl ethyl ketone, heptane, naphtha, xylene, d-limonene, and of course water). That will be a fun project for SWIM. But he doesn’t have the time for it right now. If only there was a way to have more time in a day.

Isn't it actually the hydrogen 'in statu nascendi' (as it forms) that's doing the reduction?
If so, the zinc might be replaced by for example magnesium or aluminium powder, or even iron filings.

I'm writing a movie script, and one plot point is a scene where the main character attempts to extract DMT from some MHRB that sat in his mailbox for 2 days in 90 degree weather. Thus, in the process of the extraction, I'm thinking he should attempt to reduce the Oxide that would most plausibly form.

Now, in my prior research for this script, I've deemed it unrealistic for him to have been able to acquire zinc powder (considering the characters background), but since he's also a health nut, it makes sense for him to have some powdered vitamin C. Being a stickler for accuracy in all the scripts I attach my name to, I want to know how much vitamin C per gram of MHRB I should depict this character as measuring out.

Hey 69ron

Say someone does an extraction from MHRB and isolates the product by freeze precipitation. When the Naptha is poured off, what would you do then to minimise the formation of n-oxide?
Lets say said someone typically sits the bowl under a fan and after half an hour or so scrapes up the goods. Presumably, some n-oxide will be formed.

NOW let's say he proceeds on the recrystallise, his yield goes from 5 grams to 3 grams and he notes a bunch of gunk at the bottom of his rex dish. How much of this would you say is n-oxide at a guess? I'm guessing that a lot of this is not n-oxide, but NP fats and oils that came across during extraction. Anyway, say he freeze precips again to recover and fan dries, then he's in strife as he's just formed more impurity. Etc... eventually he will have nothing left.

Anyway, my point is how would you dry to minimise the formation of n-oxide?

Elemental Zinc can be found here for very little.

Also has small amounts of reagent grade chems including 36% hcl + h2so4.

They sell to individuals and no questions are asked.

I am going to try this in my next extraction. I am hoping that it does increase my yields.

During the drying process some N-Oxide almost always forms if any oxygen is present.

When drying don't use a fan or any heat. Let it air dry at room temperature in a large room without any drafts. You want to minimize the amount of oxygen that comes into contact with the DMT while maximizing the space available for the solvent to evaporate into. So a small closed closet is not good because it will take longer for the solvent to evaporate and expose the DMT to the air longer. A large closed living room is better. Again, no fans, no heat, no drafts, and a large space is best.

A better solution is to dry it in a vacuum with all of the oxygen removed. You would first displace the oxygen by filling the vacuum chamber with an inert gas like nitrogen. Once all the oxygen is removed, then you would dry your DMT in the vacuum chamber filled with nitrogen. This procedure is dangerous; unless you absolutely know what you’re doing I really don’t recommend it.