Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
June 24, 2026
Yibo Wang, H Wang, C T Lin et al.
Natural hallucinogenic compounds have arisen independently across plants, fungi, and animals, evolving into a diverse chemical arsenal that includes phenethylamines, indolealkylamines, and terpenoid scaffolds. Beyond clinical and cultural frameworks, their ecological origins and evolutionary trajectories may help explain why such potent modulators of perception, emotion, and cognition persist...
Addictive Behaviors
June 1, 2026
Sebastian Ehmann, Nathan M. Hager, Paul S. Regier et al.
Opioid use disorder (OUD) remains a major public health crisis in the United States, with mental health disorders substantially increasing risk severity. Emerging evidence suggests psychedelics may relate to reduced OUD risk. This exploratory study examined associations between lifetime psychedelic use and OUD severity and tested whether these associations varied by mental health impairment....
Psychedelic Medicine
April 9, 2026
Alex C. Kwan
Psychedelics rose to prominence in the 1960s, around the same time when neurobiologists identified the midbrain raphe as the brain’s primary source of serotonin. It is therefore no surprise that early studies on classical psychedelics like d -lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) focused on their effects within this brainstem nucleus. This review traces the arc of discovery: from the initial report...
Psychiatry Research
December 29, 2025
Omer A. Syed, Sean M. Nestor, Muhammad Ishrat Husain et al.
1 citation
Psychedelic use has greatly increased within clinical and recreational settings over recent years. While demonstrating a favorable safety profile within certain clinical populations, little empirical research has explored safety of psychedelic use within real-world samples. Using the World Health Organization (WHO) VigiBase, a comprehensive global pharmacovigilance database with voluntary...
Journal of Psychopharmacology
December 26, 2025
Kurt Stocker, Matthias Hartmann, Yasmin Schmid et al.
5 citations
The Altered States of Consciousness Scale (3/5D-ASC or 11-ASC) is widely used to assess non-ordinary states of consciousness, particularly for psychedelic research. However, its original dimensional model (3D-ASC within 5D-ASC) and later 11-subscale structure (11-ASC) have a hierarchically incompatible higher/lower-order structure. Although the 11-ASC offers superior model fit, the 3D-ASC...
Brazilian Journal of Science
September 29, 2025
Pinelopi Vlotinou, Konstantinos Christodoulou, Anna Tsiakiri et al.
Classical psychedelics encompass psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), N, N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT), and mescaline and are psychoactive substances that primarily function as agonists at the serotonin 5-hydroxytryptamine receptors (5-HT). In the immediate term, they modify perception, cognition, emotional state, social processing, and introspection, leading to a subjective mystical...
Contemporary Drug Problems
August 28, 2025
Jason K. Day, Michael Th. Grooff
1 citation
Established by the 1971 United Nations (UN) Convention on Psychotropic Substances, the prohibition of the recreational use of psychedelics (lysergic acid diethylamide [LSD], psilocybin, N , N -dimethyltryptamine [ N , N -DMT], and mescaline) has two premises. First, recreational use poses a serious threat to public health because psychedelics are highly liable to addiction and abuse. Second,...
Journal of Psychopharmacology
July 11, 2025
Diana Glenn, Seung Hee Choi, Rick S. Zimmerman
1 citation
Background: Classic serotonergic psychedelics are 5-HT2A partial agonists that induce non-ordinary states of consciousness. Many have demonstrated anti-addictive properties; however, their impact on smoking behaviors remains under-researched. This review provides a synthesis of the therapeutic potential of these compounds in promoting smoking cessation and reduction. Methods: A systematic...
Psychopharmacology
July 1, 2025
Raly James Perez Custodio, Darlene Mae Ortiz, Hyun Jun Lee et al.
8 citations
Serotonergic psychedelics exert their effects via their high affinity for serotonin (5-HT) receptors, particularly through activating 5-HT2A receptors (5-HT2AR), employing the frontal cortex-dependent head-twitch response (HTR). Although universally believed to be so, studies have not yet fully ascertained whether 5-HT2AR activation is the sole initiator of these psychedelic effects. This is...
Current Opinion in Biotechnology
May 15, 2025
Zachary N. Abrahms, Abhishek K. Sen, J. Andrew Jones
2 citations
Naturally occurring psychoactive compounds have been used for cultural and ethnomedical purposes for centuries. Several more such molecules continue to be chemically synthesized, exhibiting a wide range of potency, therapeutic, and hallucinogenic effects. Promising clinical data and a renewed interest in understanding the cellular mechanisms of action have inspired synthetic biology efforts to...