The pharmacological activity of 1-phenyl-2-butyl- amine

Since the fundamental study by Barger and Dale (1) of the relationship be-tween the chemical constitution and physiological action of the sympathomimetic amines, numerous investigations have been made of many structurally and phar-macologically related compounds. Alles (2) showed that the introduction of a methyl group into the 1- or “alpha ” position of the fundamental 2-phenylethyla-mine structure led to a compound, now known as amphetamine, that produced greatly prolonged sympathomimetic effects and central nervous system stimula-tion, even on oral administration. The next obvious step was to determine the activity of the compound with an ethyl group in place of the methyl group. This compound, 1-phenyl-2-butylamine, was one of a series of compounds investigated by Hausehild (3) in a routine survey of 27 phenylalkylamines. Since he did not find it particularly outstanding by any of the assay procedures employed, it has apparently received little further attention. In this study, 1-phenyl-2-butyl-amine hydrochloride ’ has been compared with 2-phenylethylamine hydrochloride (“beta-phenethylamine”) and 1-phenyl-2-propylamine hydrochloride (“phen