Morning glory seed detoxification -- why before, not after, the H2O extraction?

[Samadhi-Sukha-Upekkha]

If someone wants to get LSA and related compounds out of Morning Glory seeds, or HBWR seeds, or other similar plant material, they're usually advised to remove the toxic glycosides from the seeds with naphtha (or another NPS that won't dissolve LSA).

The procedure generally reads something like "Grind up the seeds, wash them with naphtha several times, then evaporate whatever naphtha remains. Then extract the seeds with water or some other polar solvent. The polar solvent contains your LSA."

Here's my question. Why couldn't someone grind the seeds, extract them with water or other polar solvent, and then wash the polar solvent with naphtha? Sure, if you used acetone to extract, you'd have to evaporate it down and redissolve the powder/goo in something that won't mix with naphtha, like water. But that's not a big problem.

Are people worried about ingesting naphtha if it comes into contact with the water/fluid that they're going to drink? That's a reasonable concern, but I think there are ways of getting around that. Such as physically separating the water layer, and then using a fan (or blow-drier) to remove any film of NPS left on top of the water. I can't guarantee that it would remove ALL of the naphtha compounds, but then again, it seems like you could make it so there's such a small amount of NPS left in the final product that it would be less dangerous than smelling the fumes from filling up your car's gas tank.

I expect people will ask, "Why do this?"
Well, if people don't explore new ways of doing things, they never find better ways of doing things. Or ways that work better for some people and some situations than others. There's a lot of variation in teks for extracting MHRB. Some people seem to get much better results with A/B, and some people get better results with STB. Maybe doing a post-extraction solvent wash to remove glycosides would produce better results than doing a pre-extraction seed wash.

What do the chemists and people experienced with HBWR and Morning Glory think? (Special value would be placed on a response coming from someone who fits in both categories.)

 

[Observant]

Limonene is the better option for trying this .
Obvious why people try to avoid ingesting even the slightest bit of naphta .

 

[Samadhi-Sukha-Upekkha]

Great point -- in fact, why not use vegetable oil? Cheaper, easier to acquire... This tek wouldn't require any evaporation of the NPS at all, because the NPS should only contain the non-desired compounds, which could be disposed of by flushing the oil down the regular sewer system with soap and water.

Since the NPS would be applied to the water instead of the seed powder, you wouldn't even have to evaporate the NPS off of the seeds. It can just be physically separated from the water. Use of a clear and colorless oil, like a highly refined plant oil or mineral oil, would facilitate detection of the yellowish (and perhaps cloudly) compounds being removed.

LSA shouldn't be soluble in vegetable oil, but the glycosides should be. Oil isn't likely to be the greatest solvent, so it may require a lot of pulls, but oil is cheap and easily available, and I think it's easier on the environment than VOCs like naphtha or DCM.

If someone wanted to try this, how should the water's pH be managed? I'm a bit unsure whether I want acid, base, or neutral pH to keep the desired alkaloids in the water and push the toxic compounds into the vegetable/mineral oil.

Does the pH need to be changed after the defatting/detoxification step?

It would be pretty easy to use bicarb and vinegar to manage pH of this solution, since both are perfectly food safe and LSA/LSH/related compounds are active orally. Prior to ingestion, the solution could be neutralized (and perhaps evaporated), which would just give a sodium acetate solution/powder to ingest. Then you would know the dosage by knowing that, for example, a 2500 seed extraction can be divided into ten 250-seed doses. Or whatever.


If this idea can be made to work, it could end up as a fully food-safe extraction of HBWR or Ipomoea or Rivea seeds without toxins.

 

[q21q21]

Great point -- in fact, why not use vegetable oil? Cheaper, easier to acquire... This tek wouldn't require any evaporation of the NPS at all, because the NPS should only contain the non-desired compounds, which could be disposed of by flushing the oil down the regular sewer system with soap and water.

Since the NPS would be applied to the water instead of the seed powder, you wouldn't even have to evaporate the NPS off of the seeds. It can just be physically separated from the water. Use of a clear and colorless oil, like a highly refined plant oil or mineral oil, would facilitate detection of the yellowish (and perhaps cloudly) compounds being removed.

LSA shouldn't be soluble in vegetable oil, but the glycosides should be. Oil isn't likely to be the greatest solvent, so it may require a lot of pulls, but oil is cheap and easily available, and I think it's easier on the environment than VOCs like naphtha or DCM.

If someone wanted to try this, how should the water's pH be managed? I'm a bit unsure whether I want acid, base, or neutral pH to keep the desired alkaloids in the water and push the toxic compounds into the vegetable/mineral oil.

Does the pH need to be changed after the defatting/detoxification step?

It would be pretty easy to use bicarb and vinegar to manage pH of this solution, since both are perfectly food safe and LSA/LSH/related compounds are active orally. Prior to ingestion, the solution could be neutralized (and perhaps evaporated), which would just give a sodium acetate solution/powder to ingest. Then you would know the dosage by knowing that, for example, a 2500 seed extraction can be divided into ten 250-seed doses. Or whatever.


If this idea can be made to work, it could end up as a fully food-safe extraction of HBWR or Ipomoea or Rivea seeds without toxins.

SWIM has successfully done this defatting/detoxifying with canola oil. Then a cold-water extraction after

 

[69ron]

Vegetable oil is a great idea. D-limonene would work better though, because it will mix faster with the water and separate faster than vegetable oil will. But other than that, there's no real benefit to using d-limonene in this case.

By the way, this washing has nothing to do with removing glycosides.

Cyanogenic glycosides are water soluble because of the sugar they contain and so they aren't removed by such a wash. Also, I haven't seen a reliable source showing that these seeds contain any cyanogenic glycosides, but a lot of people seem to think they contain them. I think this belief stems from the fact that the effects of some LSA analogs are very similar to the effects of cyanide poisoning.

It's believed that the non-polar wash removes volatile oils that are toxic and irritate the stomach. Many volatile oils are toxic, and these seeds do contain volatile oils. This is the most believable in my opinion.

Anyway, a wash does reduce a lot of the toxic side effects, especially stomach oriented ones.

 

[Samadhi-Sukha-Upekkha]

I think I read your post a while back. Was yours the one that mentioned defatting the seed powder with the oil, then squeezing the oil out of the paste with cheesecloth or a clean white t-shirt?

If you got good results with that defat followed by the cold water extraction, then that would seem to indicate that canola oil is an effective solvent for removing the toxins while leaving the desired compounds. Were the effects from ingesting the CWE normal for the amount of seeds you used? If so, then perhaps no pH management would be necessary. Just doing a CWE followed by a few good defats may work.

If nobody has tried doing the defat/detoxification on the water extract, then my friend may have to try it and submit a report here. Though, being a somewhat careful type, he'll probably wait a bit to see what further discussion reveals.

On a side note -- are we sure that the toxins are in fact glycosides? Or does the toxic fraction include other classes of chemicals?

 

[q21q21]

I think I read your post a while back. Was yours the one that mentioned defatting the seed powder with the oil, then squeezing the oil out of the paste with cheesecloth or a clean white t-shirt?

If you got good results with that defat followed by the cold water extraction, then that would seem to indicate that canola oil is an effective solvent for removing the toxins while leaving the desired compounds. Were the effects from ingesting the CWE normal for the amount of seeds you used? If so, then perhaps no pH management would be necessary. Just doing a CWE followed by a few good defats may work.

If nobody has tried doing the defat/detoxification on the water extract, then my friend may have to try it and submit a report here. Though, being a somewhat careful type, he'll probably wait a bit to see what further discussion reveals.

On a side note -- are we sure that the toxins are in fact glycosides? Or does the toxic fraction include other classes of chemicals?

Yes, all the information is correct although it was only theorized about squeezing the oil out, it was just decanted (SWIM is slim and didn't so much mind consuming a couple tbsp of oil)

Just add enough oil to cover the seeds, shake several times over an hour or two. Let settle, decant the oil through cloth, add second batch of oil, same thing.

squeeze out cloth then wash any seed powder off with water (over the original container to catch the water)

Perform a couple washes with cold water, the water color will tell you if you are dissolving stuff. It will be initially grey-yellow and get fainter to an almost clear color.

Once the water seems to have little color then that is the final pull, let it settle, filter through cloth, let settle and use turkey baster to seperate the bottom water from the top oil.

It has very little taste and any flavoring can be mixed in for a nice cool drink.

SWIM used a combination of 1 cap of rum 20 minutes before consumption, coffee to flavor the mix and a cap of rum with the mix all to provide ideal chance for the LSA + Acetaldehyde = LSH reaction and it worked first try.

SWIM then left the brew in his fridge for a week and it lost all potency and has yet to purchase MG or HBWR yet.
He's not against the "lab chemical" LSD, while LSH is close and great, it's not great for strong trips *wink*

and once again SWIM has written WAY too much info. haha

 

[69ron]

He's not against the "lab chemical" LSD, while LSH is close and great, it's not great for strong trips *wink*

That's true for sure.

As far as I know, no one has verified that LSH is actually made by adding acetaldehyde. Right now this is all a theory. For sure, the conversion makes a HUGE difference in the effects, no matter what it makes in the end it's far more like LSD after the conversion.

SWIM would like to try 98% pure verifiable LSH some day, if ever possible. Maybe pure LSH is as good as LSD in high doses? Maybe it's the other crap present in these low tech LSH conversions that are responsible for the bad effects at high doses?

 

[Samadhi-Sukha-Upekkha]

Okay, so summary of things so far:
Vegetable oil definitely removes the toxic compounds, which are not likely to be glycosides (which an NPS wash wouldn't remove anyway) but are probably volatile oils which are irritating to the stomach. Makes sense -- nausea seems to be a common symptom of essential oil ingestion. Could be related to the taste (anyone who's ever used tea tree oil to treat cold sores can attest to how horrific it is), but it's easy to imagine that essential oils would have a direct irritating action on the stomach.

Pulls with water should keep going until the water runs mostly clear.

While we don't really know the exact chemistry that happens when LSA is exposed to acetaldehyde, bioassays reveal that the effect (when present) is clearly beneficial. So, the extract should be mixed with rum and/or coffee and/or peppermint. Caribbean Mint Coffee, anyone? (Actually, that might not taste much better than the tea tree oil. Oh well...)

A report on doing the defat to the water extract may appear some time within the next few weeks.

 

[Spiralout]

sorry for digging up an old thread, dont have a computer and it is very hard to type.

I have been very interested in lsa etc. Lately and i was wondering if anyone had tried this idea.

Hoping my heavenly blues will start really growing soon too, this is my first attempt and only 6 inches tall after 6 weeks