Department of Forensic Toxicology, Academy of Forensic Science, Shanghai Key Laboratory of Forensic Medicine (21DZ2270800), Shanghai Forensic Science Platform, Key Laboratory of Forensic Sciences, Ministry of Justice, Shanghai, PR China; School of Pharmacy, China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, PR China.
2 papers in the library · 4 citations · publishing 2025
A high-throughput screening method using direct injection was developed to detect 311 new psychoactive substances (NPS) and their metabolites in wastewater, covering synthetic cannabinoids, cathinones, phenylethylamines, tryptamines, phencyclidines, benzodiazepines, fentanyls, and piperazines. The method runs in 16 minutes, with 95.8% of targets having a limit of detection at or below 10 ng/L and recoveries between 71.01% and 119.88%. Applied to 976 real samples from a Chinese city, it identified 32 substances, with ketamine detected most frequently. This approach offers a simple analytical tool for wastewater monitoring to support early warning and assessment of drug trends.
Proscaline and methallylescaline are two phenylethylamine derivatives of the classic hallucinogen mescaline, classified as new psychoactive substances (NPS) not controlled by international drug conventions. Limited toxicity information has hindered their identification. Using high-resolution mass spectrometry with three complementary models—computational prediction, zebrafish (in vivo), and human liver microsomes (in vitro)—the study identified 7 proscaline metabolites and 11 methallylescaline metabolites for the first time. Hydroxylated and N-acetylated products were the major metabolites, enabling their selection as biomarkers for detecting intake of these two NPS over a relatively wide detection window.