A Double-blind, Randomized Trial Examining the Preliminary Efficacy of Psilocybin Therapy for People With Chronic Low Back Pain

This study evaluates whether psilocybin therapy helps patients cope with chronic low back pain more effectively. Patients may be recruited at Stanford and University of California San Francisco (UCSF), study procedures will occur at UCSF. Each participant will receive a dose of psilocybin with possibly one or more other drugs. Participants will undergo two p...

The Ecstasy of Gold in Neurodiversity: Focus on the Use of Psychedelics in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Psychedelic drugs are serotonergic hallucinogens that can be divided into two types: naturally occurring (psilocybin, psilocin, and N,N-dimethyltryptamine) and synthetic (LSD, MDMA, 2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodoamphetamine, and ketamine). Psychedelics generally work on 5-hydroxytryptamine receptors and might be useful in cognitive enhancement, brain connectivity, neu...

A128-Channel Wireless Wearable Myolink (W2 Myolink): Functional Characteristics and Multidisciplinary Experiments

Abstract This paper presents Wireless Wearable Myolink (W2 Myolink), a high-density, battery-powered system for wireless acquisition of surface electromyography(EMG) signals, and demonstrates its practicality across diverse experimentalparadigms. The device features a compact form factor (110x70x35 mm), low weight(160 g), and continuous operation for up to 6...

Psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy for psycho-existential distress in advanced cancer: a narrative review.

IntroductionThis article presents a narrative review of psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy as a promising intervention for addressing anxiety, depression and psycho-existential distress in patients with advanced cancer. This group of disorders, often resistant to conventional treatments, significantly impacts patients' quality of life and autonomy, as well as...

Fusing Specialized Surveys of Rare Populations to Larger Surveys for Generalized Inference: Cross-Sectional Survey Study.

BackgroundMainstays of pharmacoepidemiology are large, representative, behavioral surveys, which focus on many drugs with few detailed behaviors. Smaller, targeted studies measure drug-specific patterns but without explicit generalizability assumptions; the evidence generated is narrow.ObjectiveIn this cross-sectional survey study, we outline an estimation f...

"Large-Scale and Local Functional Connectivity Changes Following Psilocybin Administration in Methamphetamine Use Disorder.

Background and purposeMethamphetamine (MA) use disorder is associated with widespread disruption of large-scale brain networks involved in cognitive control, attention, and salience processing. Resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) provides a means to characterize these alterations; however, little is known about the capacity for functional network reorgani...

Psilocybin ameliorates neuropathic pain-like behaviour in mice and facilitates gabapentin-mediated analgesia.

Chronic pain states remain challenging to control with current drug therapies. Here, we demonstrate that a single dose of psilocybin produces a sustained anti-nociceptive effect in chronic neuropathic pain models in male and female mice, mediated primarily by 5-HT2A receptors. Critically, psilocybin significantly potentiates the analgesic efficacy of gabapen...

Methamphetamine-Fentanyl Polysubstance Administration Produces Social Deficits and Corticolimbic Stress-Reward Circuit Adaptations

Abstract Rationale and Objectives: Polysubstance use involving psychostimulants and opioids is increasingly prevalent and associated with elevated overdose risk, relapse vulnerability, and poor treatment outcomes. However, the neurobehavioral consequences of opioid-stimulant use remain poorly understood. We evaluated whether repeated methamphetamine-fentanyl...

Serotonergic psychedelics for Autism spectrum disorder: Neurobiological mechanisms and translational prospects.

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterized by persistent social-communication deficits, cognitive rigidity, and atypical sensory processing. Current pharmacological treatments, including risperidone and aripiprazole, provide only limited symptomatic relief and do not address the underlying neurobiological mechanisms. Converging evidence implicates dysre...

Psilocybin-Enhanced Psychotherapy for Methamphetamine Use Disorder

This is a proof-of-concept randomized clinical trial of psilocybin-enhanced psychotherapy versus treatment-as-usual among individuals being treated for methamphetamine use disorder. The trial will take place with individuals admitted to a residential rehabilitation treatment program. The treatment protocol will consist of 4 preparatory therapy visits, 2 psil...

A Randomized, Double-Blind Study of Single-Dose Psilocybin for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD)

One hundred participants, ages 21 to 65, who meet Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) criteria for major depressive disorder (MDD) will be stratified by study site and randomized with a 1-to-1 allocation under double-blind conditions to receive a single 25 mg oral dose of psilocybin or a single 100 mg oral dose of niacin. Niacin wil...

Toward Patient-Tailored Care for Treatment-Resistant Depression: A Pilot Patient-Preference Clinical Trial of Music and Mindfulness in Psilocybin-Assisted Psychotherapy

The goal of this pilot clinical trial is to learn whether it is feasible to individually tailor psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy (PAP) for people with treatment-resistant depression (TRD) based on their personal preferences. The study also aims to explore whether two different psychotherapy styles, music-centered and mindfulness-centered, influence how peop...

Distinct Modulatory Effects on Affective Biases by Different Serotonergic Psychedelics and MDMA in Male Rats: Possible Implications for Antidepressant Effects

Affective biases are important neuropsychological mechanisms by which emotions modulate cognition, behaviour and the subjective experience of mood. Previous studies have shown that the rapid-acting antidepressant, ketamine, and serotonergic psychedelic, psilocybin, modulate affective biases in a translational rat model. Both treatments differ from convention...

Psilocybin as an alternative to conventional treatments: A systematic review

Introduction. Limitations of conventional treatments for depression and anxiety, particularly in treatment-resistant cases, have driven interest in alternative therapeutic approaches. Psilocybin, a serotonergic agonist with demonstrated effects on neuroplasticity and large-scale brain networks, has emerged as a promising therapeutic option. Materials and met...

Prevalence and Correlates of Past-Year Psilocybin Use in the United States.

Classic psychedelic and cannabis use among U.S. cancer survivors aged ≥ 50 years: nationally representative estimates by cancer type/site.

PurposeTo examine the prevalence of lifetime ("ever") cannabis and classic psychedelic use, and their co-use among U.S. adults aged ≥ 50 years with versus without a lifetime history of cancer, and to describe variation by cancer type/site among survivors.MethodsWe analyzed pooled 2015-2019 and 2021-2022 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) data of ...

Wherefore the Magic? The Evolutionary Role of Psilocybin in Nature.

Research into psychedelic compounds is in resurgence because of the exciting potential for their use in the treatment of psychiatric and mental health disorders. Despite this revival, remarkably little is known about their evolution. One of the most intriguing psychedelic compounds is psilocybin, the compound found in 'magic' mushrooms and used in ritual cer...

Metastability of resting-state bold fMRI as a reliable biomarker of individual brain dynamics: An interrogation of within-subject variability as a function of total acquisition time.

Metastability of BOLD fMRI signals is a commonly used proxy of brain dynamics in behavioral and clinical studies. To date, little has been done to assess the confidence with which we can use estimates of metastability as reliable biomarkers of individual brain state. We analyze whole-brain and network-specific metastability for a highly sampled individual br...

Structural plasticity and enhanced fear extinction following psilocybin in chronically stressed mice

The classic psychedelic psilocybin elicits long-lasting neural plasticity and behavioral effects, but prior studies largely examined stress-naive animals. Using longitudinal imaging, we show that psilocybin increases dendritic spine density in frontal cortical neurons and facilitates fear extinction after chronic restraint stress, demonstrating psilocybin’s ...

A25-year analysis of Armillaria (honey mushroom) poisoning in Wisconsin.

BackgroundWild mushroom foraging is common in the United States. Poisoning usually results from misidentification, though some "edible" mushrooms can also cause toxicity. Armillaria ("honey mushrooms") are widely foraged and generally considered edible, yet sporadic gastrointestinal illness has been reported. Their clinical effects remain poorly described. P...