• N&PD Moderators: Skorpio

Lefetamine???

MattPsy said:
Also, why do we have to produce only one stereoisomer? Is the other one toxic or something? Lefetamine is a piece of cake to synthesize if one is unconcerned about chirality, and besides, if you felt strongly enough about it, you could probably resolve the enantiomers with a tartrate.

oh! and matt, can you explain how using a tartrate could be used to resolve the enantiomers and would it affect diastereomers? is it a common practice used today? (by the way this is cheeseandbaloney from the other board, 8-)
 
Hmm, on further reflection I retract that (the diastereoisomer bit), sorry! I'm not sure whether you can resolve diastereomers with a enantiopure tartrate... in fact I think it works with stereoisomers only, and only some of that at that! My bad.
(and, hi! I love teh use of "other", lol ;p)
 
Fentanyl is an example of a drug that many hobby chemists have made for their own use. Out of the 6 I knew, 5 became hopeless addicts to the stuff... dangerous.
 
Why would you have to worry about diastereomers? Wouldnt you just make the racemic mixture of DL-lefetamine? If you only created a racemic mixture you might be able to resovle it with a tartrate. Assuming that the properties of the resulting diastereomers differed enough to perform an extraction of the desired one.

Or am I missing something? I just thought that a racemic mixture would be created, and that could potentially be resolved w/ a tartrate.
 
Yea, that's what i'd thought at first, but on further reflection their properties are too similar to make it practical as far as I can see.
I still haven't been told why th racemic product is no good, though. Seems like a enantioselective synthesis is unnecessary here, unless one of the isomers is toxic/dangerous/disagreeable, etc.
 
I think the reason why people are saying you would need to separate the enantiomers is because it would be not be viable as a drug for people on the black market to produce. I think the reasoning is that if it takes over 50mg of the the active isomer, than the racemic mixture will have be dosed in amounts of 100mg, and ever greater doses as tolerance sets in. So I think that because they would have to synth such large amounts to make a large profit due to the high dosages, that they would just stick with something like fentanyl, which an equal amount would yields a much larger profit.

But that is just a trouble concerning producers who intend to sell the product, if it was just for someone's own personal use, I havent seen anything that suggests it would be bad to take the racemic product (if someone knows more about the other isomer, and whether or not it has negative effects please reveal them).
 
CH3CH2OH said:
I think the reason why people are saying you would need to separate the enantiomers is because it would be not be viable as a drug for people on the black market to produce. I think the reasoning is that if it takes over 50mg of the the active isomer, than the racemic mixture will have be dosed in amounts of 100mg, and ever greater doses as tolerance sets in. So I think that because they would have to synth such large amounts to make a large profit due to the high dosages, that they would just stick with something like fentanyl, which an equal amount would yields a much larger profit.

But that is just a trouble concerning producers who intend to sell the product, if it was just for someone's own personal use, I havent seen anything that suggests it would be bad to take the racemic product (if someone knows more about the other isomer, and whether or not it has negative effects please reveal them).
This is correct, except for the fact that if enantiospecific reductive amination can be performed then that is going to be an ingenious tool to have up ones sleeve.

I also have not ever seen any research papers for making lefetamine, nor have I seen it listed in any books with data quoted in the reference section.

Not going into synthsis discussion, I think that it must be made from PhCH2C(O)Ph starting material. If one can purchase this then they are laughing all the way to the bank, but most people have great difficulty in buying anything of a chemical nature, which is a key reason why it has never been observed.
 
Lefetamine had previously been sold as a pharmaceutical, correct? AFAIK this was a racemic product.
 
vecktor said:
like many others I have no interest in them whatsoever and I know I am not alone in thinking that the world already has enough opioids...

Sorry but NO, it simply doesn't. There's still the need for high-effective opiods (at least w/ the potency of morphine) but without the negative sideeffects like breath suppression. There IS a long way to go... The "perfect" opioid hasn't been found yet and until it has there is the need for research.

rave23 said:
can someone tell me what else MDP2P is used for though, besides doing illegal things with it?

The question isn't precise, fella. You can do a lot more then just MDMA but unfortunately most products are psychoactive and therefore forbidden. Just one example for an exception: Journal of Heterocyclic Chemistry 2006, 43(6), 1539-1547. The authors of this paper use MDP2P as precursor for a series of Benzo-2,3-diazepines which (to my knowledge) are not illegal. The chemical is so simple, there MUST be more than only amphetamine-derivatives...

Peace! Murphy
 
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We sure the racemate was sold? The name lefetamine comes from the fact that it is the levo (left-handed) isomer that is the active one. That would be like asking about 'racemic dexedrine.'

The name implies a specific isomer.
 
No, it wasn't. I went to the library today and found the book that talked about lefetamine abuse. You're right, it was enantio pure.
 
So do you guys think that it is possible that the other enantiomer does have something wrong with it that would make it undesirable (toxic, unpleasant side effects, etc.)? It just seems strange that the pharmaceutical company wouldnt just sell the racemic mix if there isnt anything wrong with the the other enantiomer.
 
^Why? Dexedrine is a well known product and that's only one isomer. The 2 isomers may well have quite different characters so the raecimate produces different effects. Like I said, it's no big deal to seperate. Are people afraid of a partial crystalisation or something?
Lefetamine was studied as a replacement for methadone in MMT but lost out to buprenorphine. Apparently, it didn't ward of withdrawal as well as buprenorphine and was itself considered 'more abusable' what ever that might mean in this instance.
Lefetamine was hugely abused in Japan just after WW2. I don't know if it was by preference or simply availability. I would suggest that something that is both a stimulant, opioid & NMDA antagonist would tick a lot of boxes in the abuse stakes.
Does anyone have binding data for the compound? I mean, if it approached morphine in opioid potency and amphetamine in stimulant potency (and, I dunno, ketamine in NMDA stakes) then it would surely be worth a go.
Having said this, for something so simple to make, we arn't exactly seeing a deluge of the stuff.
As Smyth said, asymetrical aminations are not a big issue due to the stuff that Fritzy provided.
 
What was wrong with the other isomer is that it was more fun!?
 
As I'm not wanting to promote synthesis discussion, but can see an obvious route, why not go from the suitable 1,2-diphenylethanol stereoisomer via a couple of SN2 substitution reactions to the amine as the diphenylethanol stereoisomers are available and SN2 reactions are stereospecific

I think the reason why people are saying you would need to separate the enantiomers is because it would be not be viable as a drug for people on the black market to produce. I think the reasoning is that if it takes over 50mg of the the active isomer, than the racemic mixture will have be dosed in amounts of 100mg, and ever greater doses as tolerance sets in.

Er, what about ketamine (& it's much more of a pain in the arse to synth) as well as MDMA, mescaline, pethedine (I think I've made my point) all require doses around/over 100mg?
 
...but don't ingest the potential Diphenylethylen side product,you might grow tits!
 
I was suggesting a possible reason for why it might be not very popular, as most opioid synths tend to be leaning towards fent nowadays it seems, if it is not heroin. Not sayin its not possible to make profit w/ this drug if someone wanted to, but I think if they were looking to a make a profit they would go for something more potent, thats all, esp. since there is no real demand for this drug it seems.

And I agree that using Sn2 rxns would make an enantiopure product, and if you went the route and made a racemic mixture, as was stated earlier, it could possibly by resolved.

And to Haribo, I was wondering more because if the other enantiomer was very toxic or something, perfect separation of enantiomers is fairly hard to accomplish (not saying it cant be done), but if the other enantiomer was very toxic, the risk would seem pretty great, even to ingest the resolved enantiomer. In the interest of harm reduction I suppose, just to get the info out there.
 
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^Well, no, I don't know is the simple answer, but as F&B says, it's easy to make it optically pure.

I know it was tested to see if it could be used to replace MMT but buprenorphine proved to be better.

This looks interesting: The synthesis of various pyrrylphenylethanones resembling cathinone and lefetamine is described starting from 2-chloro-1-(1-methyl-1H-pyrrol-2-yl)-2-phenylethan-1-one. Some derivatives showed good antinociceptic activity, comparable to that of morphine. The neuropsychopharmacological profile of title compounds has been also studied to explore their action on C.N.S.

That's the abstract for the article
Pyrrylphenylethanones Related to Cathinone and Lefetamine: Synthesis and Pharmacological Activities
 
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so lefetamine and 1,2-diphenylethylamine are both phenethyalmines right? they have nmda antagonists/da agonist activity? Would they both potentiated by maois like selegiline?
 
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