the most beautiful residue

No way....it looks like a christmas decoration.

That is very awesome.

[Edited on 4/30/2006 by lacrima97]

no, RBF bottom. i take this as a sign...substances of beauty will do the mind good

Very beautiful and impressive!

Reminds me strongly of 1920's art deco style

(eg. the inside decoration of artisanally bound volumes of the chemical journals of those days)

I ought to show this to my artist friend, he'll be impressed.

who says that beauty only lies in the eyes of sweet girls.......

2-fluoroamphetamine is rumoured to be more similar to amphetamine than 4-FA.


Beautiful crystals:
Does anyone have more pictures to add?

[Edited on 5-6-2006 by Vitus_Verdegast]

I don't know about p-nitroamphetamine, but N-methyl-p-nitroamphetamine was studied in certain animal models. It showed very high potency, but had also a considerably low LD50. Though the animal models were claimed to be showing hallucinogenic potency mind that this was performed at the end of the 60's when there were no generalization studies or other models that could show psychedelic or other specific activity with at least some certainty. So, all these tests showed is that N-methyl-p-nitroamphetamine is a very potent psychoactive agent with an unfavorable therapeutic index but nothing more specific than this. As far as to neurotoxicity goes I can only guess. Para nitro is not the same as para chloro, bromo or iodo groups that make neurotoxic amphetamines. If it was only for just any para substitution than those few that use p-methyl(meth)amphetamine might also worry but it seams they don’t.
Anyhow, it is not easy to prepare p-nitroamphetamine without risking going trough amphetamine which is illegal essentially all over the world. There are only limited reaction pathways that would be fully legal all the way to the product. One would be to somehow prepare p-nitrophenyacetone (by acylating p-nitrotoluene?) and reductively aminate it with NaCNBH3 or other appropriate reagents that would leave the nitro group intact.

References regarding N-methyl-p-nitroamphetamine:

Knoll, J. (1970), in Amphetamines and Related Compounds (ed. Costa and Garattini), pp. 761-780. New York: Raven Press.
Knoll, J., and Vizi, E. S. (1970), Psychopharmacologia, 4,278.
Knoll, J., Vizi, E. S., and Ecseri, Z. (1966), Arch. int. Pharmacodyn. Ther., 159, 448.
Knoll, J., Vizi, E. S., and Knoll, B. (1970), Acta Physiol. Acad. Sci. Hung., 37,151.
Knoll, J., Vizi, E. S., and Knoll, B. (1971), Proc. Eur. Soc. Study Drug Toxic., 12, 50.

Check the attached table from Hallucinogenic agents by Brimblecombe and Pinder (Bristol: Wright-Scientechnica, 1975).

In my hurry I didn't see that the paper mentioned discusses the amphetamine analog with the fluorine on the aliphatic alpha-position (CH2F) instead of the para position on the ring.

Nevertheless IMO the above description fits pretty well for 4-FA.


Concerning 2-FA: I've heard in the days of the Hive a sampler report through private communication that the effects resembled methamphetamine, were long lasting, but with a distinct hallucinogenic character ("trippy").

Unfortunately my usual chemical suppliers charges 80 euro/25 ml for 2-F-benzaldehyde (&!§$$!%£..thieves...)

Fluorobenzene is dirt cheap, it would be interesting to find a route from there. Why not chloromethylation, followed by hexamine treatment to the aldehyde? Mixtures of 2-F- and 4-F-benzaldehyde should be separated by their difference in melting points (2-F-BA = -44°C ; 4-F-BA = -10°C)..






[Edited on 6-6-2006 by Vitus_Verdegast]

More references...

Apparently p-nitro-N-methylamphetamine is a monoamine releaser, but in contrast to plain amphetamine it releases serotonin as well. See:

Leonard, B. E. Effect of four amphetamines on brain biogenic amines and their metabolites. Biochemical Pharmacology, 21(9), 1289-1297 (1972).

Leonard, B. E.; Shallice, Susan A. Effect of p-nitromethylamphetamine on biogenic amines and their amino acid precursors in rat brain. British Journal of Pharmacology, 43(4), 732-738 (1971).

Pletscher, A.; Da Prada, M.; Bartholini, G.; Burkard, W. P. Differential influence on the metabolism of endogenous aromatic monoamines of substituted aralkylamines. Helvetica Physiologica et Pharmacologica Acta, 23(4) , C102-C104 (1965). (written in German)

This might explain the putative »hallucinogenic« activity described by Knoll in his unreliable animal models. It is thus not really a hallucinogen or one could classify other similar monoamine releasers, like MDMA for example, as hallucinogens as well, but obviously they are not (at least not psychedelic in nature).

Surprisingly, I found no references on the pharmacology of the p-nitroamphetamine. So, Turd, I’m afraid your original question remains unanswered. However, given the more or less known SAR theory of these monoamine releasers (like p-X-(M)A where X=halogen, MD(M)A, MMA, indan-5-yl-isopropylamine etc.) the N-methylation only changes the selectivity between dopamine, noradrenalin and serotonin releasing while both type of compounds retain the monoamine releasing property.

I have also not found any legal route to either p-nitroamphetamine or p-nitro-N-methylamphetamine in the published literature. All articles use the nitration of (methyl)amphetamine with nitric acid. This one is the most exemplary:

Patrick, T. M., Jr.; McBee , E. T.; Hass, H. B. Synthesis of arylpropylamines. III. From nuclear nitration. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 68, 1153-1155 (1946).

Plain NaBH4 leaves the aromatic nitro intact, IIRC...

Anyhow, I haven't got the acsess to beilstein any longer but one can easily make p-nitrobenzyl cyanide and hence also p-nitrophenylacetic acid...

http://www.orgsyn.org/orgsyn/prep.asp?prep=cv1p0396
http://www.orgsyn.org/orgsyn/prep.asp?prep=cv1p0406

Although IMO a better use of the above cyanide would be to react it with ethylacetate under basic condition, hydrolyze and decarboxylate to get the P2P:

http://www.orgsyn.org/orgsyn/prep.asp?prep=cv2p0487
http://www.orgsyn.org/orgsyn/prep.asp?prep=CV2P0389

Note that the methylene hydrogens of the p-nitrobenzyl cyanide are exceptionally acidic, much more so than of plain benzyl cyanide as in the above prep, probably a even weaker base can be used but I'd rather also try PTC, like here it might work:

http://www.orgsyn.org/orgsyn/prep.asp?prep=cv6p0897

[Edited on 8-1-2007 by Sandmeyer]

Not to get off topic...Well rather back on topic.

Humble Na2SO4. This stuff leaves some beautiful, lacy white patterns of the anhydrous form when a small puddle of solution doesn't get wiped up or when an empty beaker is left overnight without washing it. These are crystal shots since I have no pics of the residue. They never form the same way twice, it seems.

Sorry about the double post. Still don't have a site to post pics to so I can use the BB code.