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Simple Alcohols

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Reuptake

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Ok, the most commonly used alcohol of abuse is ethanol. We know methanol is nasty because it is converted to formaldehyde via the alcohol dehydrogenase enzyme. We also know that people abuse 1,4 butanediol. How about the other simple alcohols like: propanol, 1,2 propanediol, 1,3 propanediol, butanol, etc, etc? How toxic are these compared to ethanol (which is pretty toxic itself except used by millions)?
PS: Don't worry, I don't think anyone is going to perform a bioassay of the above mentioned to answer my question.
 
2-Propanol is metabolised to acetone, which isnt too healthy, but I have read of some reports of 10-20ml or so of IPA being drunk (don't do this) in case of ethanol being unavailable by alkies.

I believe N-propanol is also metabolised to acetone.

Butanol is toxic, I believe, I THINK its metabolised to butanal, and as we all know, aldehydes are not too friendly on the body.
 
^^^ Like I said I wouldn't worry about anyone trying this, but ethanol is metabolised into acetaldehyde, which is toxic but tolerated. I was just wondering if the only reason we only use ethanol is because it is the product of anaerobic metabolism. I was just thinking that the other alcohols are probably of comparable toxicity (thus the use of 1,4 butanediol).
 
I have read in places that if you drink higher alcohols in sizable quantites then it can produce headaches afterwards. An example for this would be a 'dirty' distillation of alcohol broth. By dirty I mean that it is not decent.
 
Some of the more complex, substituted alcohols (eg 1,1,1-thrichloro-2-methyl-2-propanol) are very efficient CNS depressants. Also, any drugs found as carbamate esters are also active as their unesterified alcohols, but have a lower m.p. (eg ethinamate/1-ethynylcyclohexanol).

The only really dodgy ones are methanol (metabolized to formaldehyde) and ethylene glycol/1,2-ethane diol (metabolized to oxalic acid)
 
Interesting.
1) Has anyone here experimented with any of the other non-dodgy alcohols.

2) Of the other alcohols, are there ones that are possibly less harmful to the body than ethanol that are still CNS depressants.
 
I've read isopropanol (aka rubbing alcohol, 2-propanol, isopropyl alcohol) causes severe gastrointestinal distress if consumed orally.
 
Acetone is surprisingly non-toxic (although extremely nasty), as I discovered while researching what those dumbasses on alt.drugs.ghb were doing their bodies when injesting nail polish removers that had GBL as the #2 or #3 ingredient after acetone and ethyl acetate.

At that time I found case reports of accidental (kids) and intentional (suicide attempts) injestion of qtys upwards of a LITER without significant toxicity other than CNS depression and a horrible smell.

Acetone is also produced by the human body in certain situations, particularly diabetes mellitus and nutritional deprivation due to alcoholism. Sometimes such a significant qty can be produced that the person's breath can reek of acetone. It (and other ketones such as beta-hydroxy butyrate) are produced from the breakdown of fatty acids.

Of course its still nasty nasty nasty (Don't intentionally injest acetone), I turn on every fan/air filter in the house when my wife removes her toe-nail polish. Acetone is EXTREMELY flammable/explosive too.
 
Lots of the simple alcohols are active... methanol, ethanol propanol, butanol.... Methanol has the obvious formic acid downside... but the other two I'm sure are just lovely...

But I think the main reason why we use ethanol and not propanol or butanol is because of its availability
 
fungus44 said:
Is that because ethanol is easier or has been easier historically to produce?
Click to expand...

Yeast poop out ethanol, and people collect it. This is much easier than synthesizing something most of the time. For a while (a long while), this was the only option. So its kind of ingrained in culture.
 
In the UK there was a phase when tramps were driniking methylated spirits to get drunk. Fortunately strong cider is extremely cheap so perverting the laws of brevity is no longer necessary. However pure IPA alcohol is available OTC in chemists. I would have thought that the even if one does get drunk from its consumption there must be drawbacks. Come-on, if there was something in it, we would know about it by now..
 
It's not that bad for you... I think it might just be very potent, from the descriptions of little kids going totally comatose after being rubbed with IPA...
 
Originally posted by Reuptake
I was just thinking that the other alcohols are probably of comparable toxicity (thus the use of 1,4 butanediol).
Click to expand...

The thing that makes 1,4butanediol special isn't that it's an alcohol per se but that it gets metabolized to somethng nicer--namely, GHB. Diethyl ether is something that behaves very much like an alcohol in the brain and is less toxic on a per-dosage basis, which makes me wonder if alcohol could ever put you in the same dissosiative state as ether.... Not really the answer you were looking for, but something to ponder : )
 
You're kinda back to front the reuptake... GBL has direct effects while 14BD has no direct effects... Both of them get metabolised to GHB though.
 
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