Word: serotonin
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...bananas really work? The best that chemists can suggest is that bananas contain serotonin, a neurochemical that is closely related to such potent mind-benders as psilocybin and dimethyl tryptamine, and which just might, under combustion, trigger genuine physiological effects. It is far more likely that any high produced by bananas is imaginary, another indication that, given a receptive state of mind, it is possible to turn on with practically anything-or virtually nothing. Witness the fact that some undergraduates, dissatisfied with mellow yellow, are already beginning to tout the high potentiality of yet another new ingredient: spider webs...
...take daily tablets of "psychic energizer" drugs known to chemists as monoamine oxidase inhibitors. The theory is that in the brains of people suffering from severe depression, the enzyme monoamine oxidase breaks down too much of a group of mysterious brain chemicals called amines, in particular, one known as serotonin. The energizers (there are several on the prescription list, under such trade names as Marplan, Nardil, Niamid, Parnate) are supposed to block the enzyme and thus allow the serotonin to fulfill its normal function...
...trouble is, not all depressed patients respond as well as psychiatrists think they should. It has been suggested that the failures result from an initial shortage of serotonin, and that along with doses of psychic energizers, the thing to do is to supply the brain's metabolic factory with another chemical, 5-HTP, from which it can manufacture more serotonin. This two-drug treatment seemed to work in some cases, but still not as well as expected. Evidently, the reasoning ran, the 5-HTP was not being utilized efficiently...