NeuroImage: Clinical
September 19, 2022
Josua Zimmermann, Nicole Friedli, Francesco Bavato et al.
14 citations
3,4–Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, “Ecstasy”) is a serotonin- and noradrenaline-releasing substance, currently among the most widely used illicit substances worldwide. In animal studies, repeated exposure to MDMA has been associated with dendritic but also axonal degeneration in the brain. However, translation of the axonal findings, specifically, to humans has been repeatedly questioned...
The International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology
August 10, 2022
Anne Weigand, Matti Gärtner, Milan Scheidegger et al.
22 citations
BACKGROUND: Growing evidence underscores the utility of ketamine as an effective and rapid-acting treatment option for major depressive disorder (MDD). However, clinical outcomes vary between patients. Predicting successful response may enable personalized treatment decisions and increase clinical efficacy. METHODS: We here explored the potential of pregenual anterior cingulate cortex (pgACC)...
International Journal of Bipolar Disorders
July 5, 2022
Oliver G. Bosch, Simon Halm, Erich Seifritz
35 citations
Abstract This is a narrative review about the role of classic and two atypical psychedelics in the treatment of unipolar and bipolar depression. Since the 1990s, psychedelics experience a renaissance in biomedical research. The so-called classic psychedelics include lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), psilocybin, mescaline and ayahuasca. Characteristic effects like alterations in sensory...
Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience
December 3, 2021
Michael Colla, Hanne Scheerer, Steffi Weidt et al.
9 citations
The serendipitous discovery of ketamine's antidepressant effects represents one of the major landmarks in neuropsychopharmacological research of the last 50 years. Ketamine provides an exciting challenge to traditional concepts of antidepressant drug therapy, producing rapid antidepressant effects seemingly without targeting monoaminergic pathways in the conventional way. In consequence, the...
Clinical Neurophysiology
March 14, 2021
Torsten M. Meyer, Martin Brunovský, Jiřı́ Horáček et al.
25 citations
OBJECTIVE: Ketamine has been shown to be effective in treatment of episodes of major depressive disorder (MDD). This controlled study aimed to analyse the predictive and discriminative power of heart rate (HR) and heart rate variability (HRV) for ketamine treatment in MDD. METHODS: In 51 patients, HR and HRV were assessed at baseline before and during ketamine infusion and 24 hours post...
Neuroimage
January 15, 2021
Joanes Grandjean, David Buehlmann, Michaela Buerge et al.
5 citations
Hallucinogenic agents have been proposed as potent antidepressants; this includes the serotonin (5-HT) receptor 2A agonist psilocybin. In human subjects, psilocybin alters functional connectivity (FC) within the default-mode network (DMN), a constellation of inter-connected regions that displays altered FC in depressive disorders. In this study, we investigated the effects of psilocybin on FC...
Biological Psychiatry
January 13, 2020
Katrin H. Preller, Patricia Duerler, Joshua B. Burt et al.
199 citations
BackgroundThe use of psilocybin in scientific and experimental clinical contexts has triggered renewed interest in the mechanism of action of psychedelics. However, its time-dependent systems-level neurobiology remains sparsely investigated in humans.MethodsWe conducted a double-blind, randomized, counterbalanced, crossover study comprising 23 healthy human participants who received placebo and...
Schizophrenia Bulletin
October 8, 2019
Julian Rössler, Wulf Rössler, Erich Seifritz et al.
16 citations
Dopamine is involved in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. Disrupted salience processing by the salience network (SN) may be a central link between dysregulated dopamine function and psychotic symptoms. However, dopaminergic influence on the SN and its presumed influence on psychotic and subpsychotic symptoms or psychotic-like experiences in healthy individuals remain unclear. Therefore, we...
Psychological Medicine
September 10, 2019
Thomas Pokorny, Patricia Duerler, Erich Seifritz et al.
102 citations
Abstract Background Psychiatric and neurodegenerative illnesses are characterized by cognitive impairments, in particular deficits in working memory, decision-making, and executive functions including cognitive flexibility. However, the neuropharmacology of these cognitive functions is poorly understood. The serotonin (5-HT) 2A receptor might be a promising candidate for the modulation of...
bioRxiv Preprint Server
January 28, 2019
Thomas Pokorny, Patricia Duerler, Erich Seifritz et al.
2 citations
preprint
Psychiatric and neurodegenerative illnesses are characterized by cognitive impairments, in particular deficits in working memory, decision making, and executive functions including cognitive flexibility. However, the neuropharmacology of these cognitive functions is poorly understood. The serotonin (5-HT) 2A receptor might be a promising candidate for the modulation of cognitive processes....
Elife
October 25, 2018
Katrin H. Preller, Joshua B. Burt, Jie Lisa Ji et al.
416 citations
Background: Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) has agonist activity at various serotonin (5-HT) and dopamine receptors. Despite the therapeutic and scientific interest in LSD, specific receptor contributions to its neurobiological effects remain unknown. Methods: We therefore conducted a double-blind, randomized, counterbalanced, cross-over studyduring which 24 healthy human participants received...
European Neuropsychopharmacology
April 25, 2018
O. Grimm, Rainer Kraehenmann, Katrin H. Preller et al.
94 citations
Recent studies suggest that the antidepressant effects of the psychedelic 5-HT2A receptor agonist psilocybin are mediated through its modulatory properties on prefrontal and limbic brain regions including the amygdala. To further investigate the effects of psilocybin on emotion processing networks, we studied for the first-time psilocybin's acute effects on amygdala seed-to-voxel connectivity...
Journal of Neuroscience
March 19, 2018
Katrin H. Preller, Leonhard Schilbach, Thomas Pokorny et al.
75 citations
Distortions of self-experience are critical symptoms of psychiatric disorders and have detrimental effects on social interactions. In light of the immense need for improved and targeted interventions for social impairments, it is important to better understand the neurochemical substrates of social interaction abilities. We therefore investigated the pharmacological and neural correlates of...
Frontiers in Pharmacology
November 8, 2017
Rainer Kraehenmann, Dan Pokorný, Helena Aicher et al.
115 citations
Rationale: Stimulation of serotonin 2A (5-HT2A) receptors by lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and related compounds such as psilocybin has previously been shown to increase primary process thinking – an ontologically and evolutionary early, implicit, associative, and automatic mode of thinking which is typically occurring during altered states of consciousness such as dreaming. However, it is...
European neuropsychopharmacology : the journal of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology
October 1, 2017
Michael D. Wunderli, Matthias Vonmoos, Marina Fürst et al.
37 citations
Chronic use of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, "ecstasy") has repeatedly been associated with deficits in working memory, declarative memory, and executive functions. However, previous findings regarding working memory and executive function are inconclusive yet, as in most studies concomitant stimulant use, which is known to affect these functions, was not adequately controlled for....
Frontiers in Psychiatry
August 18, 2017
Zurina Hassan, Oliver G. Bosch, Darshan Singh et al.
62 citations
A feature of human culture is that we can learn to consume chemical compounds, derived from natural plants or synthetic fabrication, for their psychoactive effects. These drugs change the mental state and/or the behavioral performance of an individual and can be instrumentalized for various purposes. After the emergence of a novel psychoactive substance (NPS) and a period of experimental...
Psychopharmacology
July 1, 2017
Robin Rotz, Michael Kometer, Dario Dornbierer et al.
19 citations
Rationale Gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB) is a putative neurotransmitter, a drug of abuse, an anesthetic agent, and a treatment for neuropsychiatric disorders. In previous electroencephalography (EEG) studies, GHB was shown to induce an electrophysiological pattern of “paradoxical EEG-behavioral dissociation” characterized by increased delta and theta oscillations usually associated with sleep...
Psychopharmacology
July 1, 2017
Rainer Kraehenmann, Dan Pokorný, Leonie Vollenweider et al.
Rationale Accumulating evidence indicates that the mixed serotonin and dopamine receptor agonist lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) induces an altered state of consciousness that resembles dreaming. Objectives This study aimed to test the hypotheses that LSD produces dreamlike waking imagery and that this imagery depends on 5-HT2A receptor activation and is related to subjective drug effects....
European Neuropsychopharmacology
March 8, 2017
Oliver G. Bosch, Michael M. Havranek, A Baumberger et al.
22 citations
-receptor agonist currently used as treatment for narcolepsy but also as a drug of abuse. Non-medical GHB users have repeatedly reported prosexual effects including libido-enhancement and lowering of attractiveness standards for partner selection. Here, we examined the putative prosexual effects of oral GHB in healthy males in two experiments both employing randomized, placebo-controlled,...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
April 18, 2016
Katrin H. Preller, Thomas Pokorny, Andreas Hock et al.
175 citations
Social ties are crucial for physical and mental health. However, psychiatric patients frequently encounter social rejection. Moreover, an increased reactivity to social exclusion influences the development, progression, and treatment of various psychiatric disorders. Nevertheless, the neuromodulatory substrates of rejection experiences are largely unknown. The preferential serotonin (5-HT)...
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
April 13, 2016
Mick Lehmann, Erich Seifritz, Anke Henning et al.
58 citations
Distraction and rumination are distinct response styles that determine how an individual deals with negative thoughts and feelings. Rumination is accompanied by an elevated self-focus, which is associated with increased resting state functional connectivity and decreased reactivity within the default mode network. Interestingly, the NMDA receptor antagonist ketamine reduces functional...
Human Brain Mapping
February 25, 2016
Milan Scheidegger, Anke Henning, Martin Walter et al.
78 citations
Increased amygdala reactivity might lead to negative bias during emotional processing that can be reversed by antidepressant drug treatment. However, little is known on how N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonism with ketamine as a novel antidepressant drug target might modulate amygdala reactivity to emotional stimulation. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and...
British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology
December 11, 2015
Matthias E. Liechti, Boris B. Quednow, Evangelia Liakoni et al.
57 citations
AIMS: γ-Hydroxybutyrate (GHB) is used as a treatment for narcolepsy and alcohol withdrawal and as a recreational substance. Nevertheless, there are limited data on the pharmacokinetics and pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic relationships of GHB in humans. We characterized the pharmacokinetic profile and exposure-psychotropic effect relationship of GHB in humans. METHODS: Two oral doses of GHB (25...
NeuroImage Clinical
August 22, 2015
Rainer Kraehenmann, André Schmidt, Karl Friston et al.
107 citations
Stimulation of serotonergic neurotransmission by psilocybin has been shown to shift emotional biases away from negative towards positive stimuli. We have recently shown that reduced amygdala activity during threat processing might underlie psilocybin's effect on emotional processing. However, it is still not known whether psilocybin modulates bottom-up or top-down connectivity within the...
Psychopharmacology
July 31, 2015
Michael Kometer, Thomas Pokorny, Erich Seifritz et al.
165 citations
RationaleDuring the last years, considerable progress has been made toward understanding the neuronal basis of consciousness by using sophisticated behavioral tasks, brain-imaging techniques, and various psychoactive drugs. Nevertheless, the neuronal mechanisms underlying some of the most intriguing states of consciousness, including spiritual experiences, remain unknown.ObjectivesTo elucidate...