Jochen Gartz | |
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Born | Mansfeld, Germany | October 1, 1953
Died | October 15, 2020 67) | (aged
Occupation(s) | Chemist; Mycologist |
Years active | 1983–2020 |
Notable work | Magic Mushrooms Around the World (1996) |
Website | http://www.jochengartz.de/ |
Jochen Gartz (born 1 October, 1953) was a German chemist and mycologist who studied psilocybin mushrooms as well as other psychoactive plants. [1] [2] [3] He was considered an expert in this field. [1] Among other accomplishments, Gartz is known for discovering aeruginascin, which was originally thought to occur exclusively in Inocybe aeruginascens . [4] [5] [6] [7] [3] He is also known for theorizing that an entourage effect may occur with the combination of different active alkaloids in psilocybin mushrooms besides just psilocybin [2] [8] and for reporting that baeocystin is active as a psychedelic in humans. [3] [9] [10] [11]
Dr. Jochen Gartz is a German chemist and mycologist who has been researching psilocybin mushrooms and other psychoactive substances since 1983. He is an internationally recognized expert in the field. We interviewed him on the Entheovision Conference that took place in Berlin on the 27th and 28th of May. In this interview he is talking about the function of the drugs in the modern society , about the ritual use of drugs nowadays and about the best and the worst experience he made with drugs.The interview is in German.
Although little is known about the effects of baeocystin in isolation, Jochen Gartz, a chemist and mycologist at the Institute for Biotechnology in Germany, made anecdotal references to its psychoactivity being comparable to psilocybin in his book, "Magic Mushrooms Around the World" published in the 1997. In somewhat of a contradiction, famous mycologist Paul Stamets recently reported on The Joe Rogan podcast in 2019 that a pure baeocystin experience during a high state of anxiety didn't cause psilocybin-like hallucinations, but did dilate his pupils and cause his anxiety to disappear. [...] On the timeline of mushroom alkaloid discovery, aeruginascin sits somewhere in the middle. It was first discovered by Jochen Gartz in 1989 in Inocybe aeruginascens (hopefully you're noticing the trend of naming alkaloids after the mushrooms they're found in by now!), though recent research in late 2020 by Klára Gotvaldová and colleagues at University of Chemistry and Technology, Czech Republic discovered the presence of this alkaloid in Psilocybe cubensis, suggesting it may be more common than was once thought. [...] As well as being chemically similar to other mushroom alkaloids, aeruginascin also shares a similar structure to bufotenidine, a chemical found in the venom of some toads. In the same paper from 1989, Jochen Gartz analysed 23 cases of accidental ingestion of Inocybe aeruginascens and found that the effects always resulted in euphoria, however as with other alkaloids described here, little is known about the effects of pure formulations of aeruginascin.
Some magic mushrooms, such as those belonging to the Inocybe genus, do not have reports of traditional uses and instead were discovered by accidental hallucinogenic poisonings. For example, I. aeruginascens (Table 1) was described as psychoactive in the 1980s from unintentional intoxication in Germany and Hungary because of its similarity to the edible mushroom Marasmius oreades. Despite the unintentional consumption of I. aeruginascens, the user reported an extremely pleasant experience, described as a "good trip". This feature caught the attention of the German chemist Jochen Gartz, who discovered a new alkaloid structurally related to those found in other species of magic mushrooms, although in turn, has different pharmacological properties [30].
Early controlled studies of the psychoactivity of various species in the former Czechoslovakia concluded that Psilocybe semilanceata is a more potently psychoactive species than Psilocybe bohemica, even though both species were found to contain the same amounts of psilocybin. Thus, researchers hypothesized that the mushrooms are likely to contain additional substances that contribute to the overall psychotropic effect. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that considerable amounts of baeocystin are consistently found in samples of Psilocybe semilanceata. I am also aware of an experiment whose results showed that 4 mg of baeocystin caused mild hallucinations for three hours, while 10 mg of baeocystin were found to be about as psychoactive as a similar amount of psilocybin.
Psilocybe semilanceata is a species that blues inconsistently. The high levels of psilocybin and baeocystin making it one of the most potent species as well as one of the most constant in amount in comparison with other species (GARTZ & MÜLLER, 1989; Semerdzieva et al., 1986). In a self experiment a small sample of baeocystin from Psilocybe semilanceata (GARTZ, 1989b) (4 mg) has caused a gentle hallucinogenic experience. [...] GARTZ J., 1989b - Biotransformation of tryptamine derivatives in mycelial cultures of Psilocybe. Journal of Basic Microbiology, 29: 347-352. [Note: There was, strangely, no actual information in the cited paper (Gartz, 1989b) about the psychoactivity of baeocystin.]
Baeocystin [...] Pharmacology: psychoptic in 10 mg oral dose; 4 mg threshold (Gartz, pers. com.); active in animals (Cerletti, Advances in Pharmacology 6B: 233, 1968)