You are here:
About.com

FREE Newsletter

 
Inventors
The Invention of MDMA or Ecstasy 
 
MDMA or Esctasy Molecule
 Drug Features
Prozac
Viagra
 Related Resources
Medical Innovations
Ecstasy on the Web
E for Ecstasy by Nicholas Saunders
Complete profile on the use, history, effects and dangers, legal concerns and cultural contexts for MDMA. Note: Sadly the author Nicholas Saunders recently passed away as a result of an automobile accident.
BioChemist/Inventor Alexander Shulgin
The stepfather of MDMA.
MAPS
MAPS helps scientific researchers design, obtain governmental approval for, fund, conduct and report on psychedelic research in human volunteers. MAPS is also investigating obtaining an Orphan Drug Designation to recieve an MDMA exclusive market patent.
Ecstasy Org
Pro MDMA website that gives information on toxicity & risk, media, dance culture, manufacture, spiritual uses, emergency measures, and current research.
National Institute of Drug Abuse - MDMA
Ecstasy : An abridged FAQ
Ecstasy - Health Statistcs
Ecstasy Neurotoxicity
All About MDMA
From the wonderful folks at Lycaeum.
Pictures of Ecstasy Pills
German language, pictures of ecstasy or MDMA pills. Warnung: Ecstasy ist eine harte Droge, kein Genußmittel oder Partyspaß !

mdma or ecstasy pillBy Mary Bellis

MDMA has the full chemical name of '3,4 Methylene-dioxy-N-methylamphetamine' or 'Methylenedioxymethamphetamine'. The 3,4 indicates the way in which the components of the molecule are joined together, as it is possible to produce an isomer which has all the same components but is joined differently. Although it is derived from organic material, MDMA itself does not occur in nature, and must be created in a complex laboratory process. There are various popular street names for MDMA such as Ecstasy, E, Adam, X and Empathy.

It is a mood/mind altering drug and like Prozac works by effecting the chemical level of Serotonin in our brains, a 'neurotransmitter' naturally present in the brain which can alter our emotions. MDMA also adversely effects blood pressure and pulse rate. Chemically the drug is amphetamine like, but psychologically it's what's known as an empathogen-entactogen, empathogenic means the ability to communicate things to others or the ability to feel empathy towards others and entactogenic means feeling well or good with yourself and the world.

Ecstasy pillMDMA was patented in 1913 (patent #274.350) by the German chemical company Merck supposedly to be sold as a diet pill (the patent does not mention any intended use), the company decided against marketing the drug and had nothing more to do with it. The US army experimented with MDMA in 1953, possibly as truth serum, they have not revealed their reasons.

The man responsible for the modern research of MDMA is Alexander Shulgin, who after graduating from the University of California at Berkeley with a Ph.D. in biochemistry landed a job as a research chemist with Dow Chemicals. Among his many achievements for Dow Chemicals was one profitable insecticide and several controversial patents for what were to become popular street drugs. Dow was happy with the insecticide but Shulgin's other projects created a parting of the way between the biochemist and the chemical company. Alexander Shulgin is also the first reported human to use MDMA.

mdma or ecstasy pill - XTCShulgin continued his legal research of new compounds after leaving Dow, specializing in the phenethylamines family of drugs. MDMA is but one of 179 psychoactive drugs which he described in detail, but it is the one which he felt came closest to fulfilling his ambition of finding the perfect therapeutic drug.

Since MDMA has already been patented in 1913, it holds no profit potential for a drug company. A drug cannot be patented twice and before marketing a new drug, a company has to show that the potential side effects are justified by the drug's benefits as a medicine, and this involves long and expensive trials. The only way of recouping that expense is by obtaining exclusive rights to sell the drug through holding its patent. Only a few experimental therapists researched and tested the drug (between 1977 to 1985) for use during psychotherapy sessions. Note: View MAPS article on current patent concerns.

most common form of ecstasy pillIn 1985, MDMA/Ecstasy received massive media attention when a group of people sued the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) to try to prevent them from outlawing the drug by placing it on Schedule 1. The US Congress had passed a new law allowing the DEA to put an emergency ban on any drug that it thought might be a danger to the public. On July 1st 1985, this right was used for the first time to ban MDMA.

A hearing was held to decide what permanent measures should be taken against the drug. One side argued that MDMA caused brain damage in rats, the other side claimed this might not be true for humans and that there was proof of the beneficial use of MDMA as a drug treatment in psychotherapy. The residing judge after weighing the evidence, recommended that MDMA be placed on Schedule 3, which would have allowed it to be manufactured, used on prescription, and subject to further research. However, the DEA decided to place MDMA permanently on Schedule 1.

Trial research into the effects of MDMA on human volunteers resumed in 1993 with the approval of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The first psychoactive drug approved for human testing by the FDA.

Partial Bibliography:
E for Ecstasy by Nicholas Saunders - Published by Nicholas Saunders, 14 Neal's Yard, London, WC2H 9DP, UK. ISBN: 0 9501628 8 4. Published May 1993 - 320 pages.
and information found at The Lycaeum http://Lycaeum.org/
molecule graphic©The Lycaeum

Continue with >>> Prozac

Subscribe to the Newsletter
Name
Email

From Mary Bellis,
Your Guide to Inventors.
FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now!

Important disclaimer information about this About site.


Newsletters & RSSEmail to a friendAdd to del.icio.us
 
All Topics | Email Article | |
Our Story | Be a Guide | Advertising Info | News & Events | Work at About | Site Map | Reprints | Help
User Agreement | Ethics Policy | Patent Info. | Privacy Policy | Kids' Privacy Policy

©2006 About, Inc., A part of The New York Times Company. All rights reserved.
Mental Health

Depression Self-Test Vitamins for Depression? Bipolar Red Flags Coping With Disasters Celebrities With Bipolar

What's Hot

Gyroscopes - Elmer Sperry and Charles Stark Draper Gyroscope...Angel AlcalaThe History of the BikiniRusi Taleyarkhan Jack Johnson