The International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology
September 9, 2026
R Freire, C Chaves, M Cabo et al.
Abstract Background Anxiety disorders are among the most prevalent psychiatric disorders worldwide, causing significant impacts on physical and emotional health and substantial functional impairment. Not only individuals with anxiety disorders have severe and debilitating anxiety symptoms; patients with PTSD, OCD and mood disorders often present with anxiety. The term classic psychedelics...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
September 8, 2026
Andrian G Basargin, Andras Domokosa, Joseph J. Hennessey et al.
Of the classic psychedelics, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) is perhaps the best-known, but its complex chemical architecture has limited synthetic investigations aimed at generating analogues with improved safety and efficacy profiles. Here, we systematically deconstruct the tetracyclic ergoline core of LSD to create 9 simplified ergoline analogues (i.e., ergologs) and evaluate them in...
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
September 2, 2026
Andrea Vittorini
preprint
This hypothesis and perspective article proposes that uninterrupted daily low-dose psilocybin may constitute a pharmacologically distinct receptor-adaptation paradigm. Repeated 5-HT2A agonist pulses could progressively produce functional desensitization, internalization, and/or down-regulation; the fading of acute subjective effects may therefore mark the development of an adaptive state rather...
The International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology
September 1, 2026
Ella Nield, Martha López-canul, Antonio Inserra et al.
Abstract Background Pain conditions are major health problems resulting in physical, psychological and social impairment (1), and health care costs (2,3). Within the last decade, research has demonstrated that 5-HT2A agonists including psilocybin and LSD elicit spiritual experiences (4) and functional connectivity changes between diverse brain areas (5). Therefore, it is pertinent to...
Neuropsychopharmacology Reports
September 1, 2026
Daisuke Ibi, Rika Takaba, Keisuke Yoshida et al.
Psychedelics such as psilocybin and lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) exert hallucinogenic effects through stimulation of serotonin 5-HT2A receptors (5-HT2ARs) in the cerebral cortex. In recent years, numerous reports have demonstrated that psychedelics are effective in treating various psychiatric disorders such as major depressive disorder (MDD), treatment-resistant depression (TRD), and...
Neuroscience
August 30, 2026
Yang Wang, Sinem Cetinkaya Karaca, Mille Deckmann Rasmussen et al.
Classical psychedelics exert therapeutic effects on affective disorders, with serotonin 5-HT2A receptor activation thought to play a central role. The cellular mechanisms by which 5-HT2A signaling modulates neural circuits remain incompletely understood and may differ across mood-regulating brain regions. While psychedelic actions have been extensively studied in the medial prefrontal cortex,...
Neurochemical Research
August 27, 2026
Kazutoshi Yonemura, Nobue Kitanaka, Kazuo Tomita et al.
Cannabis, widely used for both medical and non-medical purposes, primarily contains Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (Δ9-THC) and cannabidiol (CBD). Δ9-THC is the main driver of cannabis abuse and of psychological and physical dependence, whereas CBD has limited abuse potential and is even being investigated as a treatment for cannabis use disorder and other conditions. This review aims to clarify how...
Nursing Edição Brasileira
August 27, 2026
Ana Júlia Costa Matias Gomes, Jéssica Camilo Ramos Rodrigues, Valber Pinheiro Padilha Filho
Os psicodélicos clássicos, como a psilocibina, o LSD e a DMT, têm despertado crescente interesse na psiquiatria moderna devido ao seu potencial terapêutico em transtornos resistentes ao tratamento. O mecanismo de ação primário dessas substâncias envolve o agonismo dos receptores de serotonina 5-HT2A, localizados principalmente no córtex pré-frontal. Esta revisão sistemática analisou como a...
bioRxiv
August 19, 2026
D. Momi, Yasmeen Nahas, D. Wyrick et al.
preprint
Psilocybin produces rapid and lasting therapeutic effects, yet how 5-HT2A receptor activation reshapes brain-wide circuit dynamics during acute drug administration remains poorly understood. Using simultaneous multi-region Neuropixels recordings of 46,360 single units from 35 mice, together with scalp electroencephalography (EEG), pupillometry, and locomotion monitoring, we provide a...
European Journal of Pharmacology
August 18, 2026
Sumin Ban, Kyung Oh Jeon, Su Yeon Seo et al.
3-Fluorophenetrazine (3F-phenetrazine) is a novel amphetamine-like substance that is structurally similar to phenmetrazine and 3F-phenmetrazine. Despite the emergence of 3F-phenetrazine in recreational drug markets, its neuropharmacological profile and abuse liability remain poorly characterized. This study is the first to investigate the psychostimulant, rewarding, and reinforcing properties...
ACS Pharmacology & Translational Science
August 18, 2026
Richard A Glennon, Maƚgorzata Dukat
Abstract Isotryptamines, or 2-(1-indolyl)ethylamines, are positional or geometric isomers of tryptamines where the aminoethyl substituent has been relocated from the indole 3-position to the N1-position. Early studies with these types of agents relied on peripheral tissue assays for examination of their serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT) receptor affinities to investigate structure–affinity...
Nature Communications
August 3, 2026
Frederik Gudmundsen, Julia Czurylo, Daniel Ryskamp Rijsketic et al.
Serotonergic psychedelics show therapeutic potential across neuropsychiatric disorders despite transient acute effects. These compounds share serotonin 2 A receptor agonism but differ in broader pharmacology, motivating a systematic comparison of their neurobiological effects. Here, we use [18 F]FDG-PET in rats to assess acute and one-week effects of psilocybin, LSD, and 2C-B on brain metabolic...
TIPS - Trends in Pharmacological Sciences
August 1, 2026
Sofia Nasini, Benedetta Barzon, A. Casile et al.
Classic serotonergic psychedelics act primarily via 5-HT2A receptor agonism, yet their therapeutic effects and biological responses are heterogeneous. Biological sex remains an underexamined source of this variability because many clinical and preclinical studies have not been designed to test sex-by-treatment effects. Recent preclinical findings, together with more limited human evidence,...
Cell
August 1, 2026
Yating Wen, Lingjie Tang, Wenwen Duan et al.
Cancer remains a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. While classical psychedelics have been used clinically to treat cancer-associated psychiatric disorders, their impact on tumor progression is unclear. Here, we show that by targeting the serotonin receptor 5-HT2AR, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) enhances CD8+ T cell-mediated antitumor immunity and suppresses colorectal...
Hearing research
August 1, 2026
Shuhan Lu, Zhixin Zhang, Xinmiao Xue et al.
Subjective tinnitus is a common auditory disorder characterised by the subjective perception of noise in the absence of external sound sources. Its prevalence has been rising annually due to noise exposure, medication misuse, and population ageing. Current tinnitus treatments employ antidepressants, anticonvulsants, and vasodilators, yet most demonstrate limited efficacy with significant side...
Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology and Biological Psychiatry
July 24, 2026
Omer Baruch, Nadav Reiss, Doron Todder et al.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) remains difficult to prevent after trauma, highlighting the need for early interventions that reduce the risk of chronic symptom development. This controlled study investigated the preventive potential of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) in a validated rat model of PTSD induced by predator scent stress (PSS). Adult male Sprague-Dawley rats (N = 175)...
bioRxiv
July 23, 2026
William J. Tyler, E. Sellers, Michael B. McDonnell
preprint
Repeated low-dose psilocybin is being developed as a scalable outpatient treatment for mood and anxiety disorders, but chronic exposure raises concern because psilocin binds the cardiac serotonin 5-HT2B receptor, whose sustained agonism causes drug-induced valvular heart disease (VHD). We evaluated this risk using an exposure–response model that incorporates functional efficacy and exposure...
British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology
July 21, 2026
M. B. Cervera-Sánchez, Daniel San-Juan, Roberto Díaz-peregrino et al.
Psilocybin shows potential in neuropsychiatric disorders but has a complex relationship with epilepsy and seizures. We reviewed literature up to November 2025 to identify studies relevant to psilocybin's effects on seizures and epilepsy, including our research on serotonergic modulation. Core studies addressing the research question and supplementary mechanistic evidence were included for...
bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)
July 20, 2026
Neil K. Savalia, Ling-Xiao Shao, Cory A. Knox et al.
preprint
SUMMARY How psychedelics act on cortical dendrites to produce long-lasting structural plasticity remains poorly understood. Here, we characterize the effects of psilocybin on dendritic calcium dynamics in pyramidal tract neurons of the mouse medial frontal cortex. Psilocybin transiently increases calcium event rates in apical dendritic tufts over a time course that parallels the drug’s...
Nature Neuroscience
July 20, 2026
Zhi-Peng Yu, Zhong-Yu Zhang, Qiong Li et al.
Psychedelics, known for prosocial effects and therapeutic potential in psychiatry, are often first used during adolescence, yet their enduring impact on social behavior and its underlying circuits remain unclear. Here we show that repeated exposure to the serotonergic psychedelic drug 25C-NBOMe during adolescence, but not exposure in adulthood, induced lasting competitive avoidance in male...