Why does Salvia divinorum produce psychoactive effects?
In 1982 the chemical salvinorin was isolated from the plant in Mexico by Alfredo Ortega (Ortega et al. 1982). Two years later in America, Leander Valds isolated the same compound–along with its desacetyl derivative–naming these divinorum A and divinorum B (Valds et al. 1984). Since Ortega was the first to isolate, his name got priority, and the compounds became known as salvinorin A and salvinorin B. Valds later described the additional compound salvinorin C (Valds et al. 2001). All of these compounds are chemically considered to be neo-clerodane diterpenoids. Ortega did not look into the activity of his compound, but Valds tested both a full-spectrum extract, as well as salvinorin A alone, on mice. From these tests, he concluded that salvinorin A was likely to be the primary psychoactive compound in the plant. On June 6, 1993 (exactly nine years before this FAQ was first written), Salvia divinorum researcher Daniel Siebert vaporized and inhaled an extract that contained nearly 2 mg
