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Mandell AJ, Morgan M. 
“Indoleethylamine N-methyltransferase in human brain”. 
Nat New Biol. 1971 Mar 04;230(11):85-7.
Abstract
TANIMUKAI et al, using gas-liquid separation, correlated the appearance of a bufotenin-like substance in urine and the onset of psychosis in latent schizophrenics brought on by administration of a monoamine oxidase inhibitor with aminoacid precursors of indoleamines and methyl groups. Serious doubt about endogenous bufotenin as the cause of psychiatric disturbance was cast by research demonstrating that intravenously administered bufotenin produced nothing but bizarre·cardiovascular symptoms in manZ,J. One objection to such work is that bufotenin may not easily cross the bloodbrain barrier. Recent preliminary evidence gathered in our laboratories from rats infused intraventricularly with bufotenin has suggested that this substance is at least as potent ~\s its powerfully hallucinogenic 5-methoxy congener unpublished results of D. Segal and A. J. M..

A nonspecific N·methylating enzyme for aromatic amines has been reported in mammalian tissue. Julius Axelrod has demonstrated in rabbit lung a nonspecific N-methyitransrerase which could methylate several aromatic amines. But he failed to find it in the brain of several animals, although two other N-methyltransferases have been demonstrated in the brain of various species: histamine N-methyltransferase and phenylethanolamine N-methyltransferase5. We report here the presence of a relatively specific indoleethylamine N-methy\ transferase in sheep and three human brains after previous demonstrations of its presence in the brain of chick.
Comments and Responses to this Article
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earth
Apr 17, 2011 1:59
Good Evidence of DMT Production in the Human Brain #

They used human and other animal brain samples, fed them tryptamine and a radiolabeled methyl source and then used TLC against known standards to show that the brain samples had synthesized bufotenin, N-methyltryptamine and dimethyltryptamine.

All this paper really shows is that with high enough concentrations of tryptophan, there are enzymes present that can produce DMT. It is possible that these conditions would not occur in vivo, but it is also possible that DMT production occurs in small amounts or in unusual conditions in a living brain.
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