Sciencemadness Discussion Board

I'll pay you to come up with a synthesis for me.

ibuilddinosaursforaliving - 27-4-2011 at 12:40

I'm willing to synthesize a specific racetam. My problem is, I'm not far along enough into chemistry to be able to know how to make it. If any of you guys can come up with the synthesis steps, then I'll pay you. Name your price.

Hades_Foundation - 27-4-2011 at 12:51

www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~clo/cheme160/temp/final.doc

ibuilddinosaursforaliving - 27-4-2011 at 14:07

Interesting. Piracetam is extremely close to the one I wanna make.

redox - 27-4-2011 at 14:20

May I ask your purpose for this racetam?

Also, what do you have access to? A lab? A basement?

[Edited on 27-4-2011 by redox]

ibuilddinosaursforaliving - 27-4-2011 at 15:22

I want to start designing more racetams, and hopefully the other three ampakine groups too. I have lab equipment, and access to a university lab.

ScienceSquirrel - 27-4-2011 at 16:24

£10K in advance in small bills sent by registered mail :D

peach - 28-4-2011 at 09:24

If it's for eating, don't bother.

I've tried eating piracetam and it did not a lot other than give me a mild headache. I must be too stupid for it to have anything to work with. I certainly didn't observe much, if any, improvement in my ability to think or understand new bits of information, or anything else really. I suspect the placebo effect is at work.

Which is a shame, because the idea of nootropics is interesting.

Even if you're going to sell it, it's not all that expensive to begin with.

GreenD - 28-4-2011 at 10:19

I have taken priacetam (bought 500 grams), oxiracetam (bought 100 grams) and aniracetam (100 grams).

I took the, everyday for a solid month, with the acception of piracetam, which I took for a solid 5 months.

then I abruptly stopped.

The only difference is that when I take the concoction of racetams, the strength of ritalin and other stimlants is GREATLY amplified the DAY AFTER taking.

Upon taking a racetam and a stimulant within the same day : Horrible headache 24 hours.

I would say yerba mate is by far superior to the racetams, with the exception of the increased stimulant affect - which is not nootropic at all.

Racetams are easy to synthesize, what one do you want.

mr.crow - 28-4-2011 at 11:53

Sounds like intellectual laziness and desperation. If you like racetams so much why don't you start learning about the types of organic chemistry used in its synthesis?

ScienceSquirrel - 28-4-2011 at 12:18

It is easy to devise syntheses for all the racetams.
If you have access to a reasonable lab and can order the right starting materials it will be like falling off a log!

peach - 28-4-2011 at 14:26

Here are some links which may be of use;

Ideas on synthesis of piracetam

Synthesis of 2-pyrrolidone

You may be able to buy the 2-pyrrolidone from this link, rather than make it

Ethyl bromoacetate synthesis - as it is unlikely anyone will sell you it

I now DEMAND full payment of my referrer's fee (£50) in bullion coin deposited to my Swiss bank account. I also accept paypal. ;)

But let me interest you in another offer. My auntie just died and happened to be the owner of a diamond splitting company with assets worth in excess of 1 TRILLION US DOLLAR. Because I like you so much, I've decided YOU can have this! I will simply need an additional £3,765.98 to transfer the paperwork, which has nothing to do with that holiday and home entertainment system I want which happens to cost exactly the same amount.

scientician - 29-4-2011 at 01:10

Yo, I'm with Mr. Crow. I think you should learn all the tedious bits yourself. You might find you love it - and you might find it could take you places.

scientician - 29-4-2011 at 01:42

If the prospect of using HCl in the gaseous phase has you concerned, let me assure you that glycine is highly soluble in water and can be converted to it's hydrocloride salt by the stoichiometric addition of reagent grade muriatic acid. At a lab-scale preparation, it is easy enough to dessicate the solvating water away leaving dry organic salts behind. No need to worry about the subsequent hydrolyzation during the esterification which follows.

Hades_Foundation - 29-4-2011 at 05:42

I noticed some subtle effects from piracetam. Having a clearer head, better multitasking capability. Specially when driving. But still worse than the average person, so I guess it's not so much improving abilities but rather lessening disabilities in my case. ;)

peach - 29-4-2011 at 06:25

Placebo can do incredible things; some of the results for placebo trials are truly outstanding. And I don't put the effects of piracetam anywhere near a level that I would consider it above that.

If people think eating lots of this stuff in a burst will pass their exams, I think they are misguiding themselves. I suspect a large number of the people doing so will be studying maths, sciences or engineering, biasing them towards a chemical (logical) based solution and a placebo of this kind.

However, it is certainly an interesting idea; augmenting the nervous system without distorting it the way typical (illegal) drugs do.

After consuming LSD for the first few times, Albert Hofmann noted how the world appeared to be alive again, as it was when he was a child. I have felt this also. I have wondered if perhaps it is not the drug it's self doing this, but that the brain has up-regulated the enzymatic clearing rate of the synapses, as it is metabolising the drug out of it's way. This, if it is correct, would lead to them being capable of faster transmission rates afterwards. The same way alcoholics and other drug addicts can clear the drugs far faster than those who don't use them on a regular basis.

Perhaps the same effect could be achieved by stimulating said enzymes without also tripping in the interim? Perhaps by creating a material that the enzymes respond to but the docking sites do not? But without the permanent binding nature of nerve agents, which do something similar with terminal effect.

It would be fairly simple to test this on plates (by checking the frequency at which the synapses cease to transmit any faster) and I think it'd be a worthwhile check.

A neuron typically talks in digital, at 10 - 1000 hertz. I seem to remember calculating a human spine can carry around 20Mbs of data at it's full rate. Whereas a fibre optic can manage around 450Gbs. Most of the data in a spinal cord I expect is compressible without loss, as it'll be the same thing over and over; the same way most people are fine with heavily compressed MP3's. Even at it's full rate, uncompressed, a holographic disc would store 10 minutes or so worth of it.

Those interested would likely be interested in the work done by Peter Fromhertz at the Max Plank institute in Germany, who has done some beautifully fine work with neurons, silicon and plates. Seriously, have a look at the site and some of the papers; the team are isolating individual neurons with cages, channels and pads they've grown on the silicon and are imaging the waves of impulses one by one.

A recommended read on placebo and the pharmaceutical industry at large is Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. A really nice read and 100% worth the money! I did a cover to cover read of it easy.
Quote:
Goldacre was educated at Magdalen College School, Oxford[6] then studied medicine at Magdalen College, Oxford where he obtained a first class degree in his preclinical studies in 1995.[1] While at Oxford he also edited the student magazine Isis.[7] Before going on to clinical medicine at University College London, he was a visiting researcher in cognitive neuroscience at the University of Milan, working on fMRI brain scans of language and executive function. He received a master's degree in philosophy (funded by the British Academy) from King's College London.[1][8] He passed the MRCPsych Part II examinations in December 2005 and became a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.[9] In 2008 he was a research fellow at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London.[10] As of November 2009, Goldacre is a psychiatric registrar and Guardian research fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford.[11]


[Edited on 29-4-2011 by peach]

Hades_Foundation - 29-4-2011 at 10:12

I am aware of the power of placebo. I really shouldn't have written that I noticed effects, it was only in retrospect, months later, that it seemed I better remembered routes (something I'm notoriously bad at) taken during that period.
I normally have a hard time even having a simple conversation with my passenger when I'm driving, and I get lost on roads I've taken ten times before. I figured it maybe wasn't my memory that had improved but rather my ability to multitask.
Just a theory ;)
But I can't say I noticed a difference at the time. Which was a bit of a disappointment after reading some glowing reviews. Remember one that said the day after a six or ten gram dose he was able to hear what every single instrument was playing during a big orchestra performance... now that would be nice!

GreenD - 1-5-2011 at 09:03

Like I said before - tea is more powerful than the racetams...

LSD and psilocybin induce neurogenesis (don't know the science of that) and synaptogenesis (well no shit!!).

So just take them if you want be lyke uber smart - the trick is taking them long enough without warping your view of values and morals too far from the general serotonin masses, which will end less than favourably.