"The earliest synthesis of LSD involved the use of an azide intermediate (the original Hofmann process, 1955), mixed anhydrides with triflouroacetic anhydride (1956) or sulfuric anhydride (SO3-DMF on the lithium salt, 1959), with the peptide condensation agent N,N'-carbonyldiimidazole (1960), or with the acid chloride as the active intermediate with POCl3, PCl5, or thionyl chloride (1963) or just phosphorus oxychloride (1973). Most methods are faulted due to excessive moisture sensitivity, generation of side-products, or epimerization or inversion of the 8-position carbon to form d-iso-LSD. The POCl3 procedure is clean and fast, and is the preferred process today for the synthesis of a wide variety of substituted lysergamides."
All paths are the same: they lead nowhere