METHYLAMINE RISKS and TREATMENT WITH N-DERIVATIVES OF HYPERACTIVITY, DEPRESSION AND ALCOHOLISM

Chemically, the structural formulas of monoamine neurotransmitters adrenaline, dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin are related to the mode of altering monoaminerigc function during early development by clomipramine, desipramine, nomifensine, propranolol, and zimelidine. These substances used in a series of experiments share one methyl-amine -moiety; two methyl-amine moieties in propranolol produce in experimental animals the same kind of alteration in sleep-waking cycles during a period which can be considered in human life to correspond physiologically with the last two intrauterine and first four postnatal months of human babies. During later life these five early postnatal exposures cause behaviour like attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity during a period which corresponds with human childhood, and lengthened immobility time in Porsolt's swim test, and many other human depression like behaviours in many tests of behavioural responsiveness, and increased voluntary alcohol intake and responses to test doses of alcohol not different from human excessive alcohol intake and alcoholism during adulthood. Methyl-amine derivatives can be used to cancel or modify the combined postsynaptic and hormonal pathophysiologically and pathogenetically altered influences of adrenaline, dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin neurons to thus heal the hyperactivity in childhood attention deficit disorder, to heal depression in adulthood, and to alleviate or heal alcoholism in adulthood by administering these methyl-amine derivatives during the last two intrauterine and first four postnatal months. Au plan chimique, les formules structurales de neurotransmetteurs monamine adrénaline, dopamine, noradrénaline et sérotonine sont en rapport avec le mode d'altération de la fonction monoaminergique par la clomipramine, la désipramine, la nomifensine, le propranolol, et la zimelidine au cours des premiers stades du développement. Ces substances utilisées dans une série d'expériences partagent une fraction méthyl-amine; dans le propanolol, deux fractions méthyl-amine produisent chez des animaux de laboratoire le même type d'altération des cycles sommeil-veille pendant une période que l'on peut considérer dans la vie humaine comme correspondant physiologiquement aux deux derniers mois de la vie intra-utérine et aux quatre premiers mois post-natals chez le bébé. Au cours de la vie ultérieure, ces cinq expositions précoces post-natales déclenchent des comportements tels que des