Ipomoea Violacea - LSA Presence

LSA Presence

According to some studies, the seeds of Ipomoea violacea would contain several ergoline alkaloids with an action similar to—but weaker than—that of LSD, and for this reason have long been used by the natives of Central America for preparing psychedelic infusions. Although it is important to note that those studies might be mistaking Ipomoea violacea for Ipomoea tricolor as for one done by the Ohio State University.

Other works published in the scientific review Phytochemistry and quoted by The Sociedade Brasileira de Farmacognosia, shows presence of LSA in Ipomoea violacea. However to be sure that the study lead by Ms. Naoki Asano are about Ipomoea violacea, subgenus eriospermum / sectio erpipomoea, one must access the complete work which unfortunately not of free access.

The discoverer of LSD, Albert Hofmann, is himself misleading the reader in his book Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing, and Hallucinogenic Powers by describing Ipomoea tricolor (the flower showed in the book is clearly one of Ipomoea tricolor Heavenly blue) as Ipomoea violacea. As specified in the upper section 'description', Ipomoea violacea's corolla is white only. Therefore and as long as the studies on the LSA presence in Ipomoea violacea will not specify the complete taxonomy of the plant, it cannot be testified that Ipomoea violacea contains D-lysergic acid. As for today, only Ipomoea tricolor is proved to contain LSA in its seeds.