5-MeO-DMT (5-methoxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine) or O-methyl-bufotenin is a psychedelic of the tryptamine class. It is found in a wide variety of plant species, and also is secreted by the glands of at least one toad species, the Colorado River toad. Like its close relatives DMT and bufotenin (5-HO-DMT), it has been used as an entheogen in South America. Slang terms include Five-methoxy, the power, bufo, and toad venom.
5-MeO-DMT was first synthesized in 1936, and in 1959 it was isolated as one of the psychoactive ingredients of Anadenanthera peregrina seeds used in preparing Yopo snuff. It was once believed to be a major component of the psychoactive effects of the snuff, although this has recently been shown to be unlikely, due to the limited or sometimes even non-existent quantity contained within the seeds, which instead achieve their psychoactivity from the O-demethylated metabolite of 5-MeO-DMT, bufotenin. It is metabolized mainly by CYP2D6.
Depending on whether smoked or insufflated, total duration of experience can last between 10 minutes for the former, or up to 2 hours for the latter. Effects vary and can range from radical perspective shifting and perception of new insights, euphoria, immersive experiences, dissociation and non-responsiveness, sensual/erotic enhancement, to dysphoria, fear, terror, and panic.
It has anti-anxiety and anti-depressant effects.
The Church of the Tree of Life, founded in California in 1971 by John Mann but now defunct, declared the use of 5-MeO-DMT to be a sacrament. From approximately 1971 to the late 1980s, 5-MeO-DMT was discreetly available to its members. Between 1970 and 1990, smoking of 5-MeO-DMT on parsley was probably one of the two most common forms of ingestion in the United States.
5-MeO-DMT is a methoxylated derivative of DMT. While most common psychedelics are believed to primarily elicit psychological effects through agonism of serotonin 5-HT2A receptors, 5-MeO-DMT shows 1000-fold greater affinity for 5-HT1A over 5-HT2A; In line with its affinity for 5-HT1A receptors, 5-MeO-DMT is extremely potent at suppressing the firing of dorsal raphe 5-HT neurons.