Despite their widespread Internet availability and use, many of the new drugs of abuse remain unfamiliar to health care providers. The herbal marijuana alternatives, like K2 or Spice, are a group of herbal blends that contain a mixture of plant matter in addition to chemical grade synthetic cannabinoids. The synthetic cathinones, commonly called "bath salts," have resulted in nationwide...
The kappa opioid receptor (KOPR) has been identified as a potential drug target to prevent or alter the course of mood, anxiety and addictive disorders or reduce response to stress. In a search for highly potent and selective KOPR partial agonists as pharmacological tools, we have modified 12-epi-salvinorin A, a compound which we have previously observed to be a KOPR partial agonist. Five...
Salvia divinorum is a hallucinogenic plant that is used for divination and spiritual communion by the Mazatecs of Mexico. The active component of the plant is salvinorin A, a neoclerodane diterpenoid that selectively acts as a potent κ opioid receptor agonist. Salvinorin A's novel receptor binding profile makes derivatives of the compound potentially useful in the treatment of various...
Salvia divinorum has known hallucinogenic effects and is legal in most parts of the United States. Given that this psychoactive substance has a potential of misuse and abuse, further data regarding the clinical and psychosocial factors associated with use are needed. To examine the clinical and psychosocial characteristics associated with use of salvia. The study uses data from the National...
ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE AND AIMS: The traditional use of the Hallucinogenic sage, Salvia divinorum has been of ethnopharmalogical interest for some time. This plant, endemic to Oaxaca Mexico and traditionally used by the Mazatec, is now utilized worldwide for its psychoactive effects. This use demonstrates a novel use pattern which is distinctly different from Mazatec use. This study...
The effects of salvinorin A (Salvia divinorum principal ingredient), a potent κ-opioid natural hallucinogen, on learning and memory were investigated. Wistar rats were tested in the 8-arm radial maze, for object recognition and passive avoidance tasks for spatial, episodic, and aversive memory. Attention was assessed using a latent inhibition task. Salvinorin A (80-640 μg/kg subcutaneous [sc])...
Previous structure-activity relationship studies of salvinorin A have shown that modification of the acetate functionality off the C-2 position to a methoxy methyl or methoxy ethyl ether moiety leads to increased potency at KOP receptors. However, the reason for this increase remains unclear. Here we report our efforts towards the synthesis and evaluation of C-2 constrained analogs of...
Salvia divinorum is a hallucinogenic plant with ethnopharmacological and recreational uses. It differs from classic serotonergic hallucinogens such as LSD and psilocin in both phenomenology and potent agonist activity of the active component salvinorin A at κ-opioid receptors. Awareness of S. divinorum has grown recently, with both an increase in its public representation and concern over its...
Salvia, a hallucinogenic plant legally available in most of the United States, has become a widely discussed drug in the media. The extant research on Salvia use relies on non-probability samples and studies of college students. There is a clear need for research that identifies the correlates of Salvia use using data from a large sample that is nationally representative. The current study...
Repeated exposure to drugs of abuse and stress increase dynorphin, a κ opioid receptor (KOR) ligand, in the nucleus accumbens (NAc). Acute KOR activation produces dysphoria that might contribute to addictive behavior. How repeated KOR activation modulates reward circuitry is not understood. We used intracranial self-stimulation (ICSS), a method that provides a behavioral index of reward...