Drug info - L-dopa?

[Hyperreal]

Any thoughts on using L-dopa recreationally, or possibly as a lifestlye drug for improved energy?

It's documented as increasing sex drive, memory, energy and other things. The side effects don't seem to be anything to worry about, at least not if the dose and frequency are sensible.

(I didn't know what forum to put this in. Mods move as you see fit.)

Reputation Comments on this post:

	great question-always wondered myself
	interesting topic

[Forthesevenlakes]

swim isnt so sure that the side effects are completely negligable. the site i checked out had this to say about them:

Toxic Effects

The toxic effects of levodopa with or without carbidopa are considerable.
Physical Side Effects. The physical side effects are as follows:

• Low blood pressure. Low blood pressure is a common problem during the first few weeks, particularly if the initial dose is too high. The addition of extra supplements of carbidopa reduces this effect to some degree. The patient should drink lots of fluids and possibly increase salt intake to maintain normal blood pressure.
• Arrhythmia. In some cases the drug may cause abnormal heart rhythms.
• Gastrointestinal effects. Stomach and intestinal side effects are common even with carbidopa. Taking the drug with food can alleviate the nausea. It should be noted, however, that proteins interfere with intestinal absorption of levodopa, and some physicians recommend not eating any protein until nighttime in order to avoid this interference. The drug can also cause gastrointestinal bleeding.
• Effects in the lung. Levodopa can cause disturbances in breathing function, although it may benefit PD patients who have upper airway obstruction. The mechanism of such actions is unclear.
• Hair loss.

Psychiatric and Mental Side Effects. The major adverse effects of the drug are psychiatric. Patients taking levodopa, especially in combination with other drugs, can experience the following:

• Confusion.
• Extreme emotional states, particularly anxiety.
• Vivid dreams.
• Visual and possibly auditory hallucinations. The drug may even unmask dementia that had not been previously noticed.
• Effects on learning. L-dopa appears to have mixed effects on learning. It may actually improve working memory. However, some evidence suggests that it floods and impairs areas of the brain related to other learning functions (specifically as the ability to apply different rules of behavior in similar situations.)
• Sleepiness and sleep attacks.

interestingly, the fact that it impairs areas of the brain related to learning functions would seem to work against any sort of enhanced memory. swim is wondering what its subjective feel would be like...after all it is a prodrug that increases dopamine levels, so intuitively it should increase one's energy and feel good, right? but the range of side effects seems too daunting for swim to reccomend it to any pet hamsters.

Reputation Comments on this post:

	Informative post
	good info

[hyperlite]

I know they use it in some GH boosters sold at any healthfood store. I don't any potential for it to be used recreational. I bet it would work real well during a comedown after a chemically induced "dopamine dump" session.....

[Ximot]

i used to have a pot of L-DOPA (mucuna pruriens extract). nice chunky brownish bulk powder that clumps. tasted really nice. initially gave me mild anxiety (which may have been placebo, one never knows) and dizziness, but those effects didn't come again when i used it again a few months later. Used it occasionally over a 2-year period and found it a pleasant if subtle supplement. when i took it before sleep on a near-empty stomach i always slept exceptionally well and felt refreshed in the morning. and it never gave me the dopaminey overstimulatedness/edginess of l-tyrosine or l-phenylalinine. Would use again if it came my way one day.

Reputation Comments on this post:

thanks for adding your experience

[tayo]

SWIM has made tea every once in a while from a few grams of foliage. Nice feeling. No anxiety really. SWIM had ephedra in the morning, that wore off, and the mucuna pruriens seemed to level SWIM back to normal. Interesting, maybe SWIMs depleted dopamine was restored?

[lulz]

A lot of the negative side effects of L-dopa are caused by the increase in peripheral dopamine levels (in the rest of your body outside of your central nervous system).

This is why medical supplements like Sinemet contain a decarboxylase inhibitor like carbodopa (the other ingredient is usually listed as levodopa, levodopa = L-dopa). Carbodopa stops your body from converting L-dopa into dopamine until it's inside your central nervous system. If it gets converted outside of your CNS, the dopamine can't get in to affect your neurons and just affects the rest of your body. If it gets converted on the inside, it can't get out, and only affects your nervous system.

I suspect that many people would find quite a different experience between consuming mucuna pruriens and Sinemet.

Reputation Comments on this post:

thanks for the info

[kailey_elise]

Originally Posted by lulz

...I suspect that many people would find quite a different experience between consuming mucuna pruriens and Sinemet...

What would you expect that difference to be? I know someone with access to Sinemet, and I've cautioned him against taking it recreationally (no idea if he LISTENED, however *sigh*) because I just couldn't locate any real info for him.

His thoughts were to either take it prior to speed/cocaine use, to increase available dopamine, or to save it for after his speed and/or cocaine was gone, to add depleted dopamine. My bit of research indicated that it was different dopamine that affected his high, so that taking Sinemet might be dangerous for no (recreational) reason.

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

~Kailey

[Fantasian]

SWIF has used 5-HTP on many occasions in dosages up to 400mg per day. While the effect was not the classical recreational drug it definately enhanced music and other serotogenic activities.

SWIF is interested whether administration of L-DOPA with a decraboxylaze inhibitor would produce an effect similar to that of a dopmaine agonist. While being nothing like as potent as cocaine or amphetamine an increase of dopamine would be a very effectively ally in many situations.

Any thoughts?

[Fantasian]

SWIF has a friend experimenting with this, he'll update in due time. I think understanding psychological effects may be difficult however as even a massive rush of dopamine is harder to feel than a rush of another neurotransmitter like serotonin or acetylcholine so a small increase may also be difficult.

On a side note L-DOPA is great for tanning,

[spacelord]

Hey Fantasian, if SWIYFriend hasn't conducted that experiment yet, why not try a dopamine precursor namely l-tyrosine? Would be safe and should at least give a hint what direction an experiment with l-dopa would go.

[Fantasian]

SWIF uses l-tyrosine on and off but he finds he gets moody and narky with friends, dopamines effects in full force i guess. thanks for the advice all the same. L-DOPA didnt work well for the friend. Made him feel wierd for days after. Aborted.

Reputation Comments on this post:

thanks for adding your experiences

[kalininin]

Originally Posted by Fantasian

SWIF uses l-tyrosine on and off but he finds he gets moody and narky with friends, dopamines effects in full force i guess. thanks for the advice all the same. L-DOPA didnt work well for the friend. Made him feel wierd for days after. Aborted.

swim used to be very enthusiastic bout a vitamins + plus phenylalanine formula years ago. he used it for years to combat slowness/light depression, he found to his surprise it worked well.
the phenylalanine gets converted to tyrosine btw, and this to dopamine [or was it noradrenaline?], but a hugeamount of b5 or b4 was needed for this to go ok. the moodyness/loss of jokiness/overconcentration did not happen bc of this. supplementing just tyrosine or phenylalanine produced not much positive results. he stopped using it cuz the dollar kept rising or something....lately he found the california manufacturer still exists n still makes the formula n also the choline + vites he also liked. prolly if swiy'd google phenylalanine, choline n vitamins or something one would get there....

Reputation Comments on this post:

Interesting, thanks for sharing this

[lulz]

Originally Posted by spacelord

why not try a dopamine precursor namely l-tyrosine?

Because l-dopa would be a much more effective way of tweaking dopamine levels in the brain. It has to do with how dopamine gets metabolised from tyrosine:

a) tyrosine gets converted to l-dopa by an enzyme called tyrosine hydroxylase

b) l-dopa gets converted into dopamine by an enxyme called dopamine carboxylase

The main difference between these two steps is that step a) is a rate limited reaction. A limited amount of tyrosine will get converted to l-dopa and the rate that this happens is fixed, so there's a certain amount of tyrosine you can take that will get converted to l-dopa, and if you take more than this amount it won't produce l-dopa any faster. In fact if there is too much tyrosine present, it will actually swamp the tyrosine hydroxylase and slow the process down.

Added to this limit is the fact that tyrosine is one of a dozen or so amino acids that are all competing for entry into the brain. The brain is surrounded by a membrane that filters what is allowed into it, and amino acids are all competing for the same pump that carries them across the membrane (the membrane is called the blood brain barrier). So you have to take tyrosine on an empty stomach, so that it's competing with as few as possible other amino acids, and has a better chance of getting into the brain. If it gets converted to l-dopa, and then dopamine, before it has passed the blood brain barrier, your brain will not experience any increase in dopamine levels, because dopamine is too large to pass through the blood brain barrier, and there is no special pump to carry it across.

l-dopa, on the other hand, is not rate-limited. It also has to cross into the brain using a specialised transport pump, but as soon as it's passed the blood brain barrier, 100% of it will get converted to dopamine (more or less).

There is a problem with l-dopa though - since it easily gets converted to dopamine, taking doses of l-dopa means a lot of it is likely to get converted to dopamine before it crosses the blood brain barrier. And if a lot of dopamine builds up in your body, as opposed to your brain, you experience negative side effects such as nausea and blood pressure fluctuations.

This is why someone would experience a big difference in subjective effects if they took l-dopa on its own (like the bean mucuna pruriens or the medication levodopa), compared to taking l-dopa along with something called carbodopa (like the medication Sinemet, which is a combination of l-dopa and carbodopa).

Someone responded to my comment but I must have missed it, and the answer to their question is related to my posting above:

Originally Posted by kailey_elise

What would you expect that difference to be?

Sorry for not replying sooner kailey. The difference would probably be significant. Carbodopa stops dopamine carboxylase from converting l-dopa to dopamine before it reaches the brain.

The thing is, only about 1% of l-dopa ends up making it to the brain:

While intake of L-DOPA reduced the severity of Parkinson's symptoms, suggesting that it was effectively transformed into dopamine, it also caused severe side effects such as nausea, vomiting, and altered blood pressure. Investigation into these problems revealed that the enzyme AADC (which converts L-DOPA into dopamine) is also present in areas of the body other than the brain, such as the liver and kidneys. Labelling of L-DOPA showed that only about 1% of the L-DOPA reached the brain, while the other 99% went to the GI tract (5). Therefore, scientists concluded that while the levels of dopamine returned to normal in the striatum, the levels climbed to above-normal in these other parts of the body, resulting in the side effects. As a result of this observation, scientists developed the AADC inhibitors that cannot pass the blood-brain barrier. This allowed for dopamine levels to increase in the brain, but not to become elevated in other organs and thus largely eliminated the negative side effects (3).

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neur...arrenkopf.html

People taking l-dopa because they want to "fill up the tank" of dopamine supplies in the brain, to make dopamine-intensive drugs more effective for example, are only interested in the 1% that makes it to the brain, because the pleasure response caused by dopamine only happens when dopamine interacts with dopamine neurons in certain parts of the brain.

The 99% that builds up in the digestive system would produce negative side effects when converted to dopamine. It's not that dopamine is a bad thing to have in the body, in fact it's vital to many organs and bodily systems functioning properly. But a sudden surge of dopamine in the body definitely would be a bad thing, i.e. puking, diarrhea, etc.

That being said, *too much* dopamine in the brain would also cause negative side effects of its own too, could cause a bunch of potential problems.

Long story short: l-dopa is superior to l-tyrosine, but it can cause negative side effects if you take too much. Something like Sinemet is superior to l-dopa, but will also cause negative side effects if you take too much. Moderation is every drug users best friend...

Surely someone has experimented with Sinemet as a nootropic or in relation to dopamine intensive drugs? I'm curious how useful it is in moderation, everything written in this post is just theory.

Reputation Comments on this post:

Awesome info

[Zaprenz]

Drugs(or supplements!) of L-DOPA will be self-limiting in an individual person which is probably a good thing.

Side effects might be worth dealing with if one has parkinsons.

For "smart drug" reasons / recreational(yeah right) or for treating other self-diagnosed conditions - compliance will soon end and use will fade away due to side effects.

Not worth(the money or time) investigating unless you have a medical reason which makes the side effects tolerable in comparison to medical problem itself.

[NeuroMD]

Originally Posted by lulz

The thing is, only about 1% of l-dopa ends up making it to the brain

The link does not function can you provide the study where that is stated? Thank you

[kailey_elise]

Thank you for the information!

Still not sure what the theoretical effects would be if one were to ingest, say, Sinemet then some cocaine, or if it might theoretically work better as something to ingest after a night of imbibing.

My pet fish is currently interested in perhaps ingesting it on it's own, to see if it's helpful in any way.

Again, thank you for the info!

~K. Elise

Originally Posted by lulz

Because l-dopa would be a much more effective way of tweaking dopamine levels in the brain. It has to do with how dopamine gets metabolised from tyrosine:

a) tyrosine gets converted to l-dopa by an enzyme called tyrosine hydroxylase

b) l-dopa gets converted into dopamine by an enxyme called dopamine carboxylase

The main difference between these two steps is that step a) is a rate limited reaction. A limited amount of tyrosine will get converted to l-dopa and the rate that this happens is fixed, so there's a certain amount of tyrosine you can take that will get converted to l-dopa, and if you take more than this amount it won't produce l-dopa any faster. In fact if there is too much tyrosine present, it will actually swamp the tyrosine hydroxylase and slow the process down.

Added to this limit is the fact that tyrosine is one of a dozen or so amino acids that are all competing for entry into the brain. The brain is surrounded by a membrane that filters what is allowed into it, and amino acids are all competing for the same pump that carries them across the membrane (the membrane is called the blood brain barrier). So you have to take tyrosine on an empty stomach, so that it's competing with as few as possible other amino acids, and has a better chance of getting into the brain. If it gets converted to l-dopa, and then dopamine, before it has passed the blood brain barrier, your brain will not experience any increase in dopamine levels, because dopamine is too large to pass through the blood brain barrier, and there is no special pump to carry it across.

l-dopa, on the other hand, is not rate-limited. It also has to cross into the brain using a specialised transport pump, but as soon as it's passed the blood brain barrier, 100% of it will get converted to dopamine (more or less).

There is a problem with l-dopa though - since it easily gets converted to dopamine, taking doses of l-dopa means a lot of it is likely to get converted to dopamine before it crosses the blood brain barrier. And if a lot of dopamine builds up in your body, as opposed to your brain, you experience negative side effects such as nausea and blood pressure fluctuations.

This is why someone would experience a big difference in subjective effects if they took l-dopa on its own (like the bean mucuna pruriens or the medication levodopa), compared to taking l-dopa along with something called carbodopa (like the medication Sinemet, which is a combination of l-dopa and carbodopa).

Someone responded to my comment but I must have missed it, and the answer to their question is related to my posting above:



Sorry for not replying sooner kailey. The difference would probably be significant. Carbodopa stops dopamine carboxylase from converting l-dopa to dopamine before it reaches the brain.

The thing is, only about 1% of l-dopa ends up making it to the brain:

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neur...arrenkopf.html

People taking l-dopa because they want to "fill up the tank" of dopamine supplies in the brain, to make dopamine-intensive drugs more effective for example, are only interested in the 1% that makes it to the brain, because the pleasure response caused by dopamine only happens when dopamine interacts with dopamine neurons in certain parts of the brain.

The 99% that builds up in the digestive system would produce negative side effects when converted to dopamine. It's not that dopamine is a bad thing to have in the body, in fact it's vital to many organs and bodily systems functioning properly. But a sudden surge of dopamine in the body definitely would be a bad thing, i.e. puking, diarrhea, etc.

That being said, *too much* dopamine in the brain would also cause negative side effects of its own too, could cause a bunch of potential problems.

Long story short: l-dopa is superior to l-tyrosine, but it can cause negative side effects if you take too much. Something like Sinemet is superior to l-dopa, but will also cause negative side effects if you take too much. Moderation is every drug users best friend...

Surely someone has experimented with Sinemet as a nootropic or in relation to dopamine intensive drugs? I'm curious how useful it is in moderation, everything written in this post is just theory.