myristicin

Myristicin is a chemical present in nutmeg. It has hallucinogenic properties at doses much higher than used in cooking. Myristicin is a naturally occurring insecticide and acaricide with probable neurotoxic effects on dopaminergic neurons. It causes brain damage. There have been speculations in 1963 by Alexander Shulgin that myristicin could be converted to an amphetamine metabolite in the liver by transamination http://leda.lycaeum.org/?ID=16539. This could never never be verified and seems highly unlikely from what is known about the metabolism of the related compounds safrole to piperonylic acid. Myristicin is a weak inhibitor of monoamine oxidase http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=13994372. Intoxications with myristicin or nutmeg essential oil do not resemble the effects of MDMA, MMDA, or of psychedelic drugs. Their effect is no more than an extremely unpleasant, long-lasting nausea and long-term revulsion to nutmeg.

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