This is an idea I had. Most likely the members here who are chemists will explain simply why this won't work, but I thought I'd throw it out there!

So, the problem with phalaris/grasses is because of the widely variable alkaloid content. There are many undesirables, and so one must use special strains. jamie has been cutting new ground on this, for which he should be commended!

I was thinking, wouldn't it be nice if there was a solvent that could pull only the undesirable compounds? So, a person could do a normal extraction, end up with a gooey product, and then pull out everything but the DMT.

Is there such a selective solvent?

I had an idea for how one might be made. Xylene seems to be very broad in what it pulls out. So, could a person saturate some xylene with a readily available DMT-like compound (melatonin comes to mind), and thus it would pull other things besides DMT?

There are two things I don't know about this. First, if a person saturated a solvent with one compound, will it still pull others? Second, would saturating a solvent with something similar to a certain compound actually inhibit the solvent's ability to pull the other compound?

Another thought. Between xylene, toluene, d-limo and naphtha there are differences in their solvent abilities. Could one extract a product, recombine, extract with a different solvent, recombine, and so on, with these different solvents and maybe end up with nearly pure DMT? I know all of that extracting and recombining would greatly reduce yield, but let's face it, grass is everywhere!

there is no such thing as a selective solvent.
some are more effective than others, but they will pull unwanted compounds.

Man, I thought I'd get shut down quick and easy, but not that quick and easy!


So, something does exist similar to what I was thinking of with mescaline. Perhaps "selective solvent" was not the right words, and "wash" would be more appropriate. If a person has impure mescaline, it can be washed with anhydrous acetone to remove the unwanted parts. With enough washes, along with another solvent like DCM, pure white mescaline is obtained.

Why couldn't there be something like this for DMT? I assume others have thought of it, and there's a good reason it's not around (such as, no one has found anything that works), but I haven't read anything about it.

there is...
it's called heptane.

and you just addressed why there is no such thing as a selective solvent. if there were, recrystallization wouldn't be necessary

for mescaline, the anhydrous acetone, which isn't completely anhydrous btw, isn't necessary either. freeze precipitation in a mixture of acetone/water works very well. vacuum filter it, rinse with cold acetone, then cold pet ether or vm&p naphtha.

Cool! Thanks for humoring me, benz.

I'll have to give freeze precipping my mescaline a try.

Oh, and I'm glad my nonsense was home to your 5000th post!