Amphetamine and N-Acetylamphetamine Incorporation into Hair: An Investigation of the Potential Role of Drug Basicity in Hair Color Bias
May 2001
in “
Journal of Analytical Toxicology
”
Studysummary This study found that amphetamine was preferentially incorporated into black hair compared to white hair in Long-Evans rats, suggesting a role for drug basicity in hair color-based drug incorporation. Our plain-language summary of this paper — not a Tressless recommendation.
This study investigated the role of drug basicity in the incorporation of drugs into hair of different colors using Long-Evans rats. The researchers found that amphetamine, a basic drug, was incorporated more into black hair (6.44 +/- 1.31 ng/mg) than white hair (2.04 +/- 0.58 ng/mg). In contrast, the non-basic analogue N-acetylamphetamine (N-AcAp) showed no significant difference in incorporation between black (0.87 +/- 0.08 ng/mg) and white hair (0.83 +/- 0.15 ng/mg). This suggested that drug basicity played a role in the preferential incorporation of drugs into darker hair.
