PLoS One
December 2, 2010
Gantt P. Galloway, Jennifer D. Siegrist, Lynn C. Robertson et al.
22 citations
BACKGROUND: The mechanisms of drug-induced visions are poorly understood. Very few serotonergic hallucinogens have been studied in humans in decades, despite widespread use of these drugs and potential relevance of their mechanisms to hallucinations occurring in psychiatric and neurological disorders. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We investigated the mechanisms of hallucinogen-induced visions...
Journal of Substance Use
July 30, 2010
R. L. Carhart-Harris, D. J. Nutt
108 citations
This study used a web-based questionnaire to investigate user perceptions of the benefits and harms of hallucinogenic drug use. Over 600 forms were submitted. Users were asked to comment on the acute and prolonged effects of different drugs and to provide more specific information on how particular drugs have harmed and/or helped them. Subjects reported relatively less harm associated with the...
Journal of Vision
March 19, 2010
Olivia Carter, John D. Pettigrew, Felix Hasler et al.
3 citations
Binocular rivalry refers to the fluctuations in visual awareness/suppression that occur when different images are simultaneously presented to each eye. To explore the role of serotonin (5-HT) in binocular rivalry, this study investigated the affects of the hallucinogenic 5-HT1A&2A receptor agonist psilocybin (the active compound in “magic mushrooms”), alone and after pretreatment with the...
Current Medicinal Chemistry
March 1, 2009
Javier González-Maeso, Stuart C. Sealfon
74 citations
Seven transmembrane domain receptors, also termed G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), represent the most common molecular target for therapeutic drugs. The generally accepted pharmacological model for GPCR activation is the ternary complex model, in which GPCRs exist in a dynamic equilibrium between the active and inactive conformational states. However, the demonstration that different...
TIPS - Trends in Pharmacological Sciences
August 1, 2008
Mark A. Geyer, Franz X. Vollenweider
435 citations
The history of serotonin research is closely related to the study of hallucinogenic drugs that function as agonists at serotonin-2A receptors. The fundamental idea that psychotic states seen in psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia might be attributable, in part, to abnormalities in serotonergic systems began with the almost simultaneous discovery of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD),...
Fortschritte der Neurologie · Psychiatrie
May 29, 2008
Leopold Hermle, K.‐a. Kovar, Walter Hewer et al.
24 citations
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the current research on hallucinogen induced psychiatric disorders. In addition to LSD and psilocybin hallucinogens of biologic origin are increasingly used by adolescents and young adults. METHODS: Relevant literature and related articles were identified by means of a computerized MEDLINE search including the years 1997 -...
Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences
April 1, 2008
Miho Miyajima, Toshihiko Matsumoto, Shigeo Ito
45 citations
DESIGNER DRUG ABUSE is a serious problem in Japan.1 Recently we encountered an acute intoxication in an emergency setting involving one such drug, which has never been reported as a clinical case anywhere. A 40-year-old man, with no previous history of mental disorder, although having had experiences of occasional use of street drugs, was brought to the emergency room by his mother. He was in a...
Pharmacology, Biochemistry, and Behavior
October 1, 2007
Jerrold C Winter, K C Rice, D J Amorosi et al.
73 citations
Although psilocybin has been trained in the rat as a discriminative stimulus, little is known of the pharmacological receptors essential for stimulus control. In the present investigation rats were trained with psilocybin and tests were then conducted employing a series of other hallucinogens and presumed antagonists. An intermediate degree of antagonism of psilocybin was observed following...
Pharmacology, Biochemistry, and Behavior
September 19, 2007
Chad J Reissig, Justin R Eckler, R A Rabin et al.
A previous investigation in our laboratory found that the stimulus effects of the 5-HT2A agonist, LSD, are potentiated by 5-HT1A receptor agonists including the prototypic agonist, 8-OH-DPAT. Also suggestive of behaviorally relevant interactions between 5-HT1A and 5-HT2A receptors are behavioral analyses of locomotor activity, head-twitch response, forepaw treading and production of the...
Psychopharmacology
September 13, 2007
Olivia Carter, Felix Hasler, John D. Pettigrew et al.
150 citations
RationaleBinocular rivalry occurs when different images are simultaneously presented to each eye. During continual viewing of this stimulus, the observer will experience repeated switches between visual awareness of the two images. Previous studies have suggested that a slow rate of perceptual switching may be associated with clinical and drug-induced psychosis.ObjectivesThe objective of the...