Your story on trace amines in the brain neglected to mention the most interesting and well-studied of these, the powerful endogenous hallucinogen N,N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT). DMTs role in endogenous psychosis was studied intensively in the 1960s, before research with these drugs became so controversial. We recently subjected DMT to intensive study in a group of normal volunteers. Our inability to invoke tolerance, as well as others findings that DMT crosses the blood-brain barrier, continues making DMT the most likely candidate for a trace amine of great physiological significance.
Rick J. Strassman
University of New Mexico
School of Medicine
Taos, N.M.
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