I think a common misconceptions is that DMT-N-Oxide is present in our plant extraction as an active oil. There is no hard evidence for that that I can find.
Instead, there is evidence that the active yellow/orange/red oils many of us encounter are simply DMT in oil form. As I understand it, DMT can form different weak intermolecular bonds and has many forms (polymorph). There are at least two different crystal structures identified in the literature, and then there are DMT oils (I believe).
There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the polymerized DMT oil, and many nexians have learned to enjoy it. However there are some drawbacks:
- DMT oil is harder to dissolve in Naphtha. This causes either (1) a loss of yield, or (2) the need to use hot naphtha which may pick up some unwanted plant matter and decrease purity (worst situation being grasses with gramine).
- Harder to vaporize. Not a big issue with flame, but could be inconvenient for fine-tuned electronic vaping where folks baby and nurture their wattage vs time curves
- Indistinguishable from actual plant oils, leading to dosing questions.
- Hard and messy to handle.
With this in mind, this thread is to collaborate in coming up with a minimum DMT polymerization TEK.
From what I can tell, the polymer forms during the basing step. If the water is very concentrated with ions and DMT, aggregates and polymer form overtime (I believe). There is no polymer formation during the acid step (positively charged molecules cannot aggregate).
An acid step done on DMT oil can break up DMT polymer (some folks added Zn unnecessarily and then incorrectly concluded they were reducing DMT-N-OXIDE; instead they were just breaking up the polymer with the acid and the Zn was doing nothing - in my opinion). Dissolving DMT oil in naphtha doesn't seem to change the DMT polymer state much.
Ok, so here is an outline of a TEK that tries to minimize DMT polymer:
Some ionic strength is good. For reference this Tek will target the "Max Ion TEK" ionic strength of ~1.9M. This is a great TEK and I'm using it is a reference point, but will make small changes try to minimize polymerization.
First part of the experiment will be focused on releasing the DMT salt from the plant matrix. This will be done with citric acid and freeze/thaw/warm temperature cycles. Will avoid boiling as it can break down the plant too much into stuff that will be absorbed by naphtha. This is already a known process (not new).
Second part of the TEK will be a little different than usual. To minimize polymerization, naphtha will be added first. Then, NaOH will be added in two steps. First to lightly FB DMT and allow it to move into the Naphtha as it forms and (hopefully) before it has a chance to polymerize. Finally, a 3rd NaOH addition will be done to full strength to break up any emulsions and push any remaining the DMT into the Naphtha.
Outline: (9/22 edit: moved to new outline/logic shown in post #10)
- Mix 100g of powdered bark, 1L of water, and 60g of citric acid
- Freeze/thaw/warm to 50C three times.
- Add Naphtha. This is not a defat step. This naphtha will be present to grab onto DMT as soon as it forms in the next step to try to minimize DMT aggregation/polymerization in the alkaline water. This is really the only thing that is "new"
- Add 50g of NaOH and mix (citric acid and plant neutralization along with gentle basing will occur, expect a milky emulsion). Don't mix to quickly so solution stays bellow 50C.
- Add 25g of NaOH and mix (strong basing, expect good separation).
- Separate Naphtha, do a few more pulls, reduce solvent volume, and freeze as usual.
If anyone has any thoughts or knows why this could be wrong let me know. Otherwise I'll test this out in the next few weeks. Cheers.
Instead, there is evidence that the active yellow/orange/red oils many of us encounter are simply DMT in oil form. As I understand it, DMT can form different weak intermolecular bonds and has many forms (polymorph). There are at least two different crystal structures identified in the literature, and then there are DMT oils (I believe).
There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the polymerized DMT oil, and many nexians have learned to enjoy it. However there are some drawbacks:
- DMT oil is harder to dissolve in Naphtha. This causes either (1) a loss of yield, or (2) the need to use hot naphtha which may pick up some unwanted plant matter and decrease purity (worst situation being grasses with gramine).
- Harder to vaporize. Not a big issue with flame, but could be inconvenient for fine-tuned electronic vaping where folks baby and nurture their wattage vs time curves

- Indistinguishable from actual plant oils, leading to dosing questions.
- Hard and messy to handle.
With this in mind, this thread is to collaborate in coming up with a minimum DMT polymerization TEK.
From what I can tell, the polymer forms during the basing step. If the water is very concentrated with ions and DMT, aggregates and polymer form overtime (I believe). There is no polymer formation during the acid step (positively charged molecules cannot aggregate).
An acid step done on DMT oil can break up DMT polymer (some folks added Zn unnecessarily and then incorrectly concluded they were reducing DMT-N-OXIDE; instead they were just breaking up the polymer with the acid and the Zn was doing nothing - in my opinion). Dissolving DMT oil in naphtha doesn't seem to change the DMT polymer state much.
Ok, so here is an outline of a TEK that tries to minimize DMT polymer:
Some ionic strength is good. For reference this Tek will target the "Max Ion TEK" ionic strength of ~1.9M. This is a great TEK and I'm using it is a reference point, but will make small changes try to minimize polymerization.
First part of the experiment will be focused on releasing the DMT salt from the plant matrix. This will be done with citric acid and freeze/thaw/warm temperature cycles. Will avoid boiling as it can break down the plant too much into stuff that will be absorbed by naphtha. This is already a known process (not new).
Second part of the TEK will be a little different than usual. To minimize polymerization, naphtha will be added first. Then, NaOH will be added in two steps. First to lightly FB DMT and allow it to move into the Naphtha as it forms and (hopefully) before it has a chance to polymerize. Finally, a 3rd NaOH addition will be done to full strength to break up any emulsions and push any remaining the DMT into the Naphtha.
Outline: (9/22 edit: moved to new outline/logic shown in post #10)
- Mix 100g of powdered bark, 1L of water, and 60g of citric acid
- Freeze/thaw/warm to 50C three times.
- Add Naphtha. This is not a defat step. This naphtha will be present to grab onto DMT as soon as it forms in the next step to try to minimize DMT aggregation/polymerization in the alkaline water. This is really the only thing that is "new"

- Add 50g of NaOH and mix (citric acid and plant neutralization along with gentle basing will occur, expect a milky emulsion). Don't mix to quickly so solution stays bellow 50C.
- Add 25g of NaOH and mix (strong basing, expect good separation).
- Separate Naphtha, do a few more pulls, reduce solvent volume, and freeze as usual.
If anyone has any thoughts or knows why this could be wrong let me know. Otherwise I'll test this out in the next few weeks. Cheers.