Clinical research into serotonergic psychedelic drugs including psilocybin, LSD and N,N-DMT (e.g., in ‘ayahuasca’) is expanding rapidly and clinical trials across a range of psychiatric conditions have shown promising efficacy, with larger trials ongoing. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has emerged as a brain imaging strategy commo...
Healthful behaviours such as maintaining a balanced diet, being physically active and refraining from smoking have major impacts on the risk of developing cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and other serious conditions. The burden of the so-called 'lifestyle diseases'-in personal suffering, premature mortality and public health costs-is considerable. ...
After decades of stagnancy, research on psychedelic substances (such as LSD, psilocybin or DMT) has experienced a renaissance over the last 10 years, with various major research programs being conducted across Europe and the United States. This research primarily investigates the potential of psychedelics in the treatment of mental health disorders, their sh...
After decades of stagnancy, research on psychedelic substances (such as LSD, psilocybin or DMT) has experienced a renaissance over the last 10 years, with various major research programs being conducted across Europe and the United States. This research primarily investigates the potential of psychedelics in the treatment of mental health disorders, their sh...
BackgroundThe recognition of emotions in facial expressions (REFE) is a core aspect of social cognition. Previous studies with the serotonergic hallucinogens lysergic acid diethylamide and psilocybin showed that these drugs reduced the recognition of negative (fear) faces in healthy volunteers. This trial assessed the acute and prolonged effects of a single ...
Altered waking states of consciousness and its underlying functional organization have gained increasing interest in recent years, i.e. in identifying the neural basis of consciousness. To overcome fundamental shortcomings of current methods to objectively assess the level of consciousness, the investigators propose here to apply a novel and empirically vali...
LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide) and psilocybin (the active substance in "magic mushrooms") are widely used for recreational purposes. Both substances are also increasingly used in psychiatric and psychological research to induce and investigate alterations in waking consciousness and associated brain functions (functional brain imaging, "model psychosis"). ...
Abstract This article reports on the experiences of four healthy individuals who attended a legal psilocybin truffle retreat in the Netherlands. The study employed a qualitative phenomenological approach, using semi-structured interviews to gain an understanding of participants' psilocybin experiences and their after-effects. The experiential themes that eme...
Healthful behaviors such as maintaining a balanced diet, being physically active, and refraining from smoking have major impacts on the risk of developing cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and other serious conditions. The burden of the so-called “lifestyle diseases” - in personal suffering, premature mortality, and public health costs - is consider...
Healthful behaviors such as maintaining a balanced diet, being physically active, and refraining from smoking have major impacts on the risk of developing cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and other serious conditions. The burden of the so-called “lifestyle diseases” - in personal suffering, premature mortality, and public health costs - is consider...
BackgroundPsilocybin is the psychoactive component in Psilocybe mushrooms ('magic mushrooms'). Whether and how the quality of the psilocybin-induced experience might mediate beneficial health outcomes is currently under investigation, for example, in therapeutic applications. However, to date, no meta-analysis has investigated the dose-dependency of subjecti...
The emerging novel therapeutic psilocybin produces psychedelic effects via engagement of cerebral serotonergic targets by psilocin (active metabolite). The serotonin 2A receptor critically mediates these effects by altering distributed neural processes that manifest as increased entropy, reduced functional connectivity (FC) within discrete brain networks (i....
ABSTRACT Background Psilocybin is a psychedelic drug that has shown lasting positive effects on clinical symptoms and self-reported well-being following a single dose. There has been little research into the long-term effects of psilocybin on brain connectivity in humans. Aims Evaluate changes in resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC) at one-week and t...
RationaleMajor depressive disorder is one of the leading global causes of disability, for which the classic serotonergic psychedelics have recently reemerged as a potential therapeutic treatment option.ObjectiveWe present the first meta-analytic review evaluating the clinical effects of classic serotonergic psychedelics vs placebo for mood state and symptoms...
Addressing global mental health is a major 21st-century challenge. Current treatments have recognized limitations; in this context, new ones that are prophylactic and effective across diagnostic boundaries would represent a major advance. The view that there exists a core of transdiagnostic overlap between psychiatric disorders has re-emerged in recent years...
Mindfulness-based interventions and psychedelic-assisted therapy have been experimentally utilised in recent years as alternative treatments for various psychopathologies with moderate to great success. Both have also demonstrated significant post-acute and long-term decreases in clinical symptoms and enhancements in well-being in healthy participants. These...
Serotonergic agonist psilocybin is a psychedelic with antidepressant potential. Sleep may interact with psilocybin's antidepressant properties like other antidepressant drugs via induction of neuroplasticity. The main aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of psilocybin on sleep architecture on the night after psilocybin administration. Regarding the po...
Serotonergic agonist psilocybin is a psychedelic with antidepressant potential. Sleep may interact with psilocybin’s antidepressant properties like other antidepressant drugs via induction of neuroplasticity. The main aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of psilocybin on sleep architecture on the night after psilocybin administration. Regarding the po...
Psilocybin is a classic serotonergic hallucinogen acting on the 5-HT2A receptor. It is used recreationally and in psychiatric research. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) like escitalopram are first-line treatments for depression. They inhibit the serotonin transporter (SERT). This might cause a possible downregulation of postsynaptic 5-HT recep...
It has been reported that serotonergic hallucinogens like lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) induce decreases in functional connectivity within various resting-state networks. These alterations were seen as reflecting specific neuronal effects of hallucinogens and it was speculated that these shifts in connectivity underlie the characteristic subjective drug e...