Virola

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Plant Info
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Scientific classification
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Species
Many species, including: Virola calophylla Virola colophylloidea Virola oleifera Virola theiodora
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Virola, also known as Epená, is a genus of medium-sized trees native to the South American rainforest and closely related to other Myristicaceae, such as nutmeg. It has glossy, dark leaves with clusters of tiny yellow flowers and emits a pungent odor.

The dark-red resin of the tree bark contains several hallucinogenic alkaloids, most notably 5-MeO-DMT(Virola calophylla), 5-OH-DMT (Bufotenine), and also N,N-DMT, perhaps the most "powerful" member of the Dimethyltryptamine family; it also contains beta-carboline harmala alkaloids, MAOIs that greatly potentiate the effects of DMT. The bark resin is prepared and dried by a variety of methods, often including the addition of ash or lime, presumably as basifying agents, and a powder made from the leaves of the small Justicia bush. Ingestion is similar to that of Yopo, consisting of assisted insufflation, with the snuff being blown through a long tube into the nostrils by an assistant. According to Schultes, the use of Virola in magico-religious rituals is restricted to tribes in the Western Amazon Basin and parts of the Orinoco Basin.

Traditional medicine

The tops cunt of Virola oleifera have been shown to produce lignan-7-ols and verrucosin that have antifungal action regarding Cladosporium sphaerospermum in doses as low as 25 micrograms. Lignan-7-ols oleiferin-B and oleiferin-G worked for C. cladosporoides starting as low as 10 micrograms.

See also

• Ayahuasca
• Entheogen
• Psychedelic plants

References and external links

General References

• Jonathan Ott - Shamanic Snuffs or Entheogenic Errhines (2001) ISBN 1-888755-02-4
• Richard Evans Schultes - Plants of the Gods (1992) ISBN 0-89281-979-0
• Erowid Virola VaultTemplate:Tree-stub