Phencyclidine laboratory

Chait, L.D., and Balster, R.L. Interaction between phencyclidine and pentobarbital in several species of laboratory animals. 

Yago, K.B. Pitts, F.N., Jr. Burgoyne, R.W. Aniline, 0. Yago, L.S. and Pitts, A.F. The urban epidemic of phencyclidine (PCP) use Clinical and laboratory evidence from a public psychiatric hospital emergency service. J Cl in Psychiatry 42 193-196, 1981. 

In the past year, our forensic chemists participated with special agents in the seizure of over 30 domestic clandestine laboratories which were producing LSD, phencyclidine (PCP), dimethyl trypta-mine (DMT), methamphetamine, and liquid hashish. DEA chemists have also examined illegal laboratories in Europe, South America, and the Far East. These laboratories were producing heroin or cocaine. 

The tests are designed to predict which of seven categories of drug the suspect may have used (1) CNS depressants, (2) CNS stimulants, (3) cannabinoids, (4) phencyclidine, (5) opioids, (6) hallucinogens, and (7) inhalants. The combination of results from the laboratory analysis of the blood or urine sample and from the 12-step evaluation test will help decide whetherthe defendant was impaired at the time of the stop. 

PCP (PHENCYCLIDINE) Also known as angel dust, a powerful and toxic synthetic chemical developed in home laboratories. 

Phencyclidine (PCP) is a synthetic chemical that can be derived from an essential oil of the sassafras tree and is the best-known representative of the class of drugs collectively known as arylcyclohexylamines. As a chemical, PCP was first synthesized in 1926 and was briefly used in the 1950s as a dissociative anaesthetic. The chemicals needed to manufacture PCP are also readily available and inexpensive, and the production process requires little formal chemical knowledge or laboratory equipment. 

Medical use in humans was discontinued in 1965 and veterinary use was discontinued in 1978. Today, phencyclidine is manufactured in illegal laboratories and utilized as a drug of abuse. 

The antipsychotic-like effects of (+)-6a (MGS0008) and (+)-7b (MGS0028) on laboratory animals are shown in Table 3.2 [15, 51]. It was recently found that phencyclidine... 

Drug abuse has become a major problem for the United States and many other countries around the world. The analysis of drugs of abuse now accounts for a major proportion of the workload of state and local forensic science laboratories. The most commonly encountered drugs of abuse at the present time are cannabis (marijuana), cocaine (crack), heroin, phencyclidine (PCP), lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), amphetamines, including 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA) and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), and other designer drugs. 

Phencyclidine (PCP), first sold as an animal tranquiliier, has been abused for years. PCP is submitted to the laboratory as either a powder or a liquid or may be found on vegetation such as marijuana or cigarettes in either a crystalline form or sprayed on as a liquid. The sole source of PCP is from clandestine laboratories, which means that the illicit samples are almost never pure but are mixed with precursors and byproducts of the synthesis. The contamination of illicit PCP by the carbonitrile precursor piperidinocyclohexanecarbonitrile (PCC) is a likely possibility. In addition, several other PCP derivatives have been identified in street samples. Table 16.4 lists some homologs and analogs to PCP that can be found in illicit samples. Any or all of these compounds could be misidentified for PCP if the proper analytical conditions are not controlled. For the reasons above, high resolution is required for separation and identification. 

As I have pointed out before, street samples do not always contain what is claimed. They are often mixtures, and they may hold components which are unknown to us. In such cases, GC-MS is of great help. A product which was submitted to our laboratory as Mescaline did not contain a trace of 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenyl-ethylamine but instead 2 different organic bases could be isolated and identified by GC-MS, Fig. 3 gives the mass spectrum of the major component which led to its identification as l-(l-phenyl)--cyclohexylpiperidine or phencyclidine, the active ingredient of Sernyl, the so-called peace drug. 

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