Neuropharmacology
December 27, 2017
Leor Roseman, Lysia Demetriou, Matthew B. Wall et al.
239 citations
Recent evidence indicates that psilocybin with psychological support may be effective for treating depression. Some studies have found that patients with depression show heightened amygdala responses to fearful faces and there is reliable evidence that treatment with SSRIs attenuates amygdala responses (Ma, 2015). We hypothesised that amygdala responses to emotional faces would be altered...
Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology
December 17, 2017
Alexander M. Sherwood, Thomas E Prisinzano
Disrupted mental health affects up to one in three individuals globally and is an unmet medical challenge contributing to individual suffering as well as significant societal and economic burden [1...
Psychiatric News
November 30, 2017
Richard Karel
3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) holds promise to once again become a therapeutic tool. After 16 years of preliminary clinical trials, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in late August gave expedited approval for multiple phase 3 trials of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) as a potential "breakthrough therapy" for treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The complex...
Frontiers in Psychiatry
November 20, 2017
Laura Orsolini, Gabriele Duccio Papanti, Domenico de Berardis et al.
99 citations
Hallucinogen-persisting perception disorder (HPPD) is a syndrome characterized by prolonged or reoccurring perceptual symptoms, reminiscent of acute hallucinogen effects. HPPD was associated with a broader range of LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide)-like substances, cannabis, methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), psilocybin, mescaline, and psychostimulants. The recent emergence of novel...
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...
Psychopharmacology
November 8, 2017
R. L. Carhart-Harris, Mark Bolstridge, C. M. J. Day et al.
978 citations
RATIONALE: Recent clinical trials are reporting marked improvements in mental health outcomes with psychedelic drug-assisted psychotherapy. OBJECTIVES: Here, we report on safety and efficacy outcomes for up to 6 months in an open-label trial of psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression. METHODS: Twenty patients (six females) with (mostly) severe, unipolar, treatment-resistant major...
Journal watch
November 3, 2017
In 1970, the FDA categorized psilocybin as a Schedule 1 drug, largely because of its recreational uses, which include inducing spirituality and
Psychopharmacology
October 30, 2017
J. B. Stroud, Tom P. Freeman, Robert Leech et al.
102 citations
RATIONALE: Depressed patients robustly exhibit affective biases in emotional processing which are altered by SSRIs and predict clinical outcome. OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study is to investigate whether psilocybin, recently shown to rapidly improve mood in treatment-resistant depression (TRD), alters patients' emotional processing biases. METHODS: Seventeen patients with...
Journal of Psychopharmacology
October 17, 2017
Peter S. Hendricks, Michael S Crawford, Karen L. Cropsey et al.
91 citations
Criminal behavior exacts a large toll on society and is resistant to intervention. Some evidence suggests classic psychedelics may inhibit criminal behavior, but the extent of these effects has not been comprehensively explored. In this study, we tested the relationships of classic psychedelic use and psilocybin use per se with criminal behavior among over 480,000 United States adult...
Personality and Individual Differences
October 15, 2017
Frederick S. Barrett, Matthew W Johnson, Roland R. Griffiths
98 citations
Classic hallucinogens (e.g. psilocybin and LSD) have substantial effects on perception, cognition, and emotion that can often be psychologically challenging, however we know very little regarding the source of significant individual variability that has been observed in the frequency and intensity of challenging experiences (i.e. "bad trips") with psychedelics. Previous clinical and...
Scientific Reports
October 13, 2017
Robin Carhart-Harris, Leor Roseman, Mark Bolstridge et al.
590 citations
Psilocybin with psychological support is showing promise as a treatment model in psychiatry but its therapeutic mechanisms are poorly understood. Here, cerebral blood flow (CBF) and blood oxygen-level dependent (BOLD) resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC) were measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) before and after treatment with psilocybin (serotonin agonist) for...
Journal of Psychopharmacology
October 11, 2017
Roland R. Griffiths, Matthew W. Johnson, William A. Richards et al.
528 citations
Psilocybin can occasion mystical-type experiences with participant-attributed increases in well-being. However, little research has examined enduring changes in traits. This study administered psilocybin to participants who undertook a program of meditation/spiritual practices. Healthy participants were randomized to three groups (25 each): (1) very low-dose (1 mg/70 kg on sessions 1 and 2)...
TIPS - Trends in Pharmacological Sciences
September 22, 2017
Evan J. Kyzar, Charles D. Nichols, Raul R. Gainetdinov et al.
155 citations
Psychedelic drugs, such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), mescaline, and psilocybin, exert profound effects on brain and behavior. After decades of difficulties in studying these compounds, psychedelics are again being tested as potential treatments for intractable biomedical disorders. Preclinical research of psychedelics complements human neuroimaging studies and pilot clinical trials,...
Journal of Natural Products
September 20, 2017
Claudius Lenz, Jonas Wick, Dirk Hoffmeister
62 citations
We report the identification of ω-N-methyl-4-hydroxytryptamine (norpsilocin, 1) from the carpophores of the hallucinogenic mushroom Psilocybe cubensis. The structure was elucidated by 1D and 2D NMR spectroscopy and high-resolution mass spectrometry. Norpsilocin has not previously been reported as a natural product. It likely represents the actual psychotropic agent liberated from its...
Harm Reduction Journal
September 4, 2017
Martin Andersson, Mari Persson, Anette Kjellgren
93 citations
BACKGROUND: Treatment resistant cluster headache and migraine patients are exploring alternative treatments online. The aim of this study was to improve comprehension regarding the use of non-established or alternative pharmacological treatments used by sufferers of cluster headaches and migraines. METHODS: A qualitative thematic analysis of the users' own accounts presented in online forum...
Drug Testing and Analysis
August 29, 2017
Torsten Passie, Udo Benzenhöfer
43 citations
Abstract This article describes the context in which 3,4‐methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA), 3,4‐methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and other mescaline‐like compounds were explored as hallucinogens for military and intelligence purposes from the 1940s to the 1960s. Germans first tested mescaline as a “truth drug” in a military context. In the 1940s, the United States military started testing...
Journal of Psychedelic Studies
August 29, 2017
Eduardo Ekman Schenberg, Maria Angélica de Castro Comis, João Felipe Morel Alexandre et al.
39 citations
Objective This report documents the phenomenology of the subjective experiences of 22 patients with substance-related disorders who were involved in a treatment combining cognitive–behavioral therapy and hospital sessions with ibogaine in Brazil. Methods Participants underwent a one-to-one semi-structured interview exploring the subjective effects of ibogaine. We employed interpretative...
Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics
August 24, 2017
Edward M. Sellers, Deborah B. Leiderman
27 citations
Interest in the potential therapeutic benefits of psychedelic agents has recently increased. In addition to psilocybin, a wide variety of agents with psychedelic properties have been proposed and partially tested. However, the challenges of obtaining approval to market a restricted psychotomimetic agent are formidable.
Psychopharmacology
August 23, 2017
Ben Sessa
92 citations
Given the plethora of new studies and published papers in the scientific press and the increasingly emerging presence of articles about positive psychedelic experiences appearing in the popular media, there is little doubt that we are in the midst of a Psychedelic Renaissance. The classical psychedelic drugs LSD and psilocybin and the entactogen MDMA are showing promise as tools to assist...
Performance Research
August 18, 2017
Jennifer Fisher
1 citation
This article examines DMT by Jeremy Shaw, a Berlin-based Canadian artist whose oeuvre has investigated altered states. For this 2004 video work, Shaw administered the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine to a group of friends and videotaped their experiences. I am interested in how Shaw curates the psychedelic session as a performance of the drug’s agency and aesthetic power. A powerful entheogen...