Research
Does microdosing LSD work?
A new study has shown microdosing LSD is not beneficial, but researchers say it does not disprove possible benefits.

Published
2 years agoon

A recent study testing the impact of microdosing LSD has suggested the practice has no therapeutic or cognitive effects.
Results from a new study have shown that microdosing LSD has no beneficial impact on mood and cognition, in what researchers have described as a “disappointing surprise”.
There has been numerous claims from people self-administering LSD of its impact on mental health conditions such as depression, and improving cognitive function – with workers in Silicon Valley turning to the compound to enhance their job performance, for example.
Whilst this evidence has been anecdotal, results from one recent citizen science study of people microdosing psychedelics, published in the journal Nature: Scientific Reports, led by University of British Columbia Okanagan Campus (UBCO) researchers, demonstrated that participants reported fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression and greater feelings of wellbeing.
This most recent study, carried out by researchers at the University of Chicago and published in published the journal Addiction Biology, examined the impact of four repeated low doses of LSD, administered under lab conditions, every three to four days.
Although results demonstrated no benefits to the practice, Harriet de Wit, PhD, professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at the university, has noted that the study doesn’t disprove microdosing’s possible benefits and that more investigation is needed.
De Wit commented: “These drugs are already being used out in the world, and it’s important for us to test them under controlled conditions, ensure their safety and see whether there’s some validity to the benefits people claim.
“That’s something that has been missing from the conversation.”
For the study, one group of participants received 13 micrograms of LSD and a second received 26 micrograms – compared to macrodoses of 100 to 200 micrograms – and the third received a placebo.
Participants were not told what kind of drug was being tested in the study or that the study was about microdosing, and all attended a drug-free follow-up session three to four days after the final dose.
To measure the results, participants completed cognitive and emotional tasks both during the drug administration sessions and at the drug-free follow-up session, to assess their mood and mental performance. The researchers found that the LSD did not improve mood or affect participants’ performance on cognitive tests, either during the drug sessions or at the follow-up session.
Because LSD acts through serotonin receptors, where traditional antidepressants are known to act, De Wit said the results were a disappointing surprise, and that the team were expecting to document a beneficial effect.
de Wit commented: “We can’t say necessarily that microdosing doesn’t work. All we can say is that, under these controlled circumstances, with this kind of participant, these doses, and these intervals, we didn’t see a robust effect,” noting that outside the lab environment, people who microdose often have strong expectations of beneficial effects.
“It is possible that these expectations contribute to the apparent benefits, or they may interact with the pharmacological effect of the drug.”
The researchers did find however, that microdosing LSD was safe, and that participants appeared to build a tolerance to LSD over the course of the study.
There researchers noted it was important to undertake this kind of research as practices like microdosing become commercialised.
“There are a lot of companies getting into the drug business, either with psychedelic drugs, or drugs like cannabidiol,” said de Wit. “And really there’s not very much empirical support to back up their claims. So, I think we have a responsibility to investigate and validate the claims.”
Current clinical research on microdosing is very limited. The University of Chicago has previously carried out a study on micorodsing LSD, as has the Beckley Foundation, looking at microdosing for brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). Another study has also suggested psilocin could cause cardiotoxic effects.
Speaking at a panel on microdosing in 2021, Gregory Ferenstein, CEO at Frederick Research, emphasised the importance of combining microdosing practices with therapy and mindfulness to gain therapeutic effects.
Commenting on the UCBO citizen science study, Ferenstein remarked that: “I think what the [placebo] study showed was that if you do psychedelics without any help, without any professional oversight or mindfulness practice, you are not going to get much out of it. And I don’t think that’s controversial.”
The University of Chicago researchers highlight that completing its study was a challenge due to the heavy regulation of LSD – with the lab needing DEA, FDA and Institutional Review Boards review and approval to carry out.
This an an issue facing many psychedelic researchers across the globe – as these compounds show potential promise for mental health conditions, regulatory barriers can get in the way of collecting empirical evidence that could lead to the development of new mental health treatments in the face of a global mental health crisis.
[activecampaign form=52]
You may like
Psilocybin analogue shows positive results in Phase 2 depression study
Clerkenwell Health calls for volunteers to support groundbreaking psychedelic research
Short Wave Pharma: innovating eating disorder care with psychedelics
Canada recommends launch of Veterans psychedelic research programme
US allocates $2 million for psychedelic research into Substance Use Disorder
Understanding variability in psychedelic treatment responses
Research
Mapping the effects of ketamine on the brain

Published
3 days agoon
5th December 2023By
News Editor
A new study has mapped the effects of ketamine on the brain, finding that repeated use over extended periods creates widespread structural changes in the brain’s dopamine system.
The study found that repeated ketamine exposure leads to a decrease in dopamine neurons in midbrain regions linked to regulating mood. They also revealed an increase in dopamine neurons in the hypothalamus, which regulates the body’s basic functions like metabolism and homeostasis.
A former finding that ketamine decreases dopamine in the midbrain, may indicate why long-term abuse of ketamine could cause users to exhibit similar symptoms to people with schizophrenia.
The researchers suggest that their new finding that ketamine increases dopamine in the parts of the brain that regulate metabolism, published in Cell Reports, may help explain why it shows promise in treating eating disorders.
They suggest this strengthens the case for developing ketamine therapies that target specific areas of the brain, rather than administering doses that wash the entire brain in ketamine.
Raju Tomer, the senior author of the paper, stated: “Instead of bathing the entire brain in ketamine, as most therapies now do, our whole-brain mapping data indicates that a safer approach would be to target specific parts of the brain with it, so as to minimise unintended effects on other dopamine regions of the brain.”
Tracking detailed data
The researchers tracked highly detailed data that enabled them to track how ketamine affects dopamine networks across the brain.
The insight revealed that ketamine reduced the density of dopamine axons (nerve fibers) in the areas of the brain responsible for hearing and vision, while increasing dopamine axons in the brain’s cognitive centers, which may help explain the dissociative behavioral effects observed in individuals exposed to ketamine.
Malika Datta, a co-author of the paper, added: “The restructuring of the brain’s dopamine system that we see after repeated ketamine use may be linked to cognitive behavioral changes over time.”
Most studies of ketamine’s effects on the brain to-date have looked at the effects of acute exposure – how one dose affects the brain in the immediate term.
For this study, researchers examined repeated daily exposure over the course of up to ten days. Statistically significant alterations to the brain’s dopamine makeup were only measurably detectable after ten days of daily ketamine use.
The researchers also assessed the effects of repeated exposure to the drug at two doses, one dose analogous to the dose used to model depression treatment in mice, and another closer to the dose that induces anesthesia. The drug’s effects on dopamine system were visible at both doses.
“The study is charting a new technological frontier in how to conduct high-resolution studies of the entire brain,” said Yannan Chen, paper co-author.
It is the first successful attempt to map changes induced by chronic ketamine exposure at what is known as “sub-cellular resolution,” in other words, down to the level of seeing ketamine’s effects on parts of individual cells.
Most sub-cellular studies of ketamine’s effects conducted to date have been hypothesis-driven investigations of one area of the brain that researchers have targeted because they believed that it might play an important role in how the brain metabolises the drug.
This study is the first sub-cellular study to examine the entire brain without first forming such a hypothesis.
Bradley Miller, a Columbia psychiatrist and neuroscientist who focuses on depression, said: “Ketamine rapidly resolves depression in many patients with treatment-resistant depression, and it is being investigated for longer-term use to prevent the relapse of depression.
“This study reveals how ketamine rewires the brain with repeated use. This is an essential step for developing targeted treatments that effectively treat depression without some of the unwanted side effects of ketamine.”
“This study gives us a deeper brain-wide perspective of how ketamine functions that we hope will contribute to improved uses of this highly promising drug in various clinical settings as well as help minimise its recreational abuse. More broadly, the study demonstrates that the same type of neurons located in different brain regions can be affected differently by the same drug,” added Tomer.
Research
Psilocybin analogue shows positive results in Phase 2 depression study

Published
1 week agoon
30th November 2023By
News Editor
Cybin has announced positive Phase 2 topline safety and efficacy data for its proprietary deuterated psilocybin analogue – CYB003 – for the treatment of major depressive disorder (MDD).
Results from Cybin’s study have shown that 79% of patients were in remission from depression at six weeks after receiving two doses of CYB003.
CYB003 demonstrated a large improvement in symptoms after one dose and a total of 79% of patients were responsive to the treatment. The compound also demonstrated an excellent safety profile in doses tested, with all reported adverse events mild to moderate and self–limiting.
Additionally, Cybin has stated that the magnitude of improvement was superior compared to approved antidepressants and recently reported data with other psychedelics, stating that the effects translate into an unprecedented effect size.
The company has said that the results compare favorably to pooled data from 232 industry studies of current standard-of-care antidepressants, SSRIs, submitted to the FDA.
The announcement follows Phase 2 interim results in early November 2023, which demonstrated that CYB003 saw a “rapid, robust and statistically significant reduction in symptoms of depression three weeks following a single 12mg dose compared to placebo”.
Cybin CEO, Doug Drysdale, stated: “We are delighted to share that CYB003 achieved the primary efficacy endpoint in this study and showed rapid and statistically significant improvements in depression symptoms after a single dose, with a clear incremental benefit of a second dose, resulting in four out of five patients in remission from their depression at six weeks.
“This is an impressive finding and follows on from the unprecedented interim results we announced earlier this month.”
Drysdale emphasised that the strength of the data will support CYB003 into Phase 3 of the study.
Cybin CMO, Amir Inamdar, added: “The significant reduction in depression symptoms observed in our Phase 2 study is highly gratifying.
“At the three-week primary efficacy endpoint, a single 12mg dose of CYB003 showed a rapid, robust, and highly statistically significant improvement in depression symptoms compared to placebo, with a -14.08 point difference in change from baseline in MADRS.
“This translated into a very large effect size. Similar significant and robust effects were also seen with a single 16mg dose, which resulted in an improvement in symptoms of depression as measured using the MADRS total score by about 13 points versus placebo.
“These effects were evident on day one with the 16mg dose and were also highly statistically significant. When data from 12mg and 16mg are pooled, these robust effects are maintained. Further, with two doses, response and remission rates in excess of 75% were observed with CYB003 (12mg).
“With these findings in hand, we are encouraged by the potential of CYB003 to help those with MDD and look forward to progressing to a multinational, multisite Phase 3 study early next year.”
Cybin is planning on submitting topline data to the FDA with an aim to hold a Phase 2 meeting in Q1 of 2024, with further 12-week durability data from Phase 2 CYB003 expected in Q1, and recruitment for the Phase 3 study anticipated to begin by the end of Q1 2024.
Research
Clerkenwell Health calls for volunteers to support groundbreaking psychedelic research

Published
2 weeks agoon
27th November 2023By
News Editor
Mental health research provider Clerkenwell Health is calling for volunteers to join its groundbreaking clinical trials that will research whether psychedelics can provide effective treatments for complex mental health conditions.
Clerkenwell is seeking a diverse group of volunteers from across the UK between 18 and 65 years old to take part in the trials if they suffer from a relevant condition.
The trials, which will be conducted at Clerkenwell Health’s purpose-built facility near Harley Street in London, are being run in partnership with a number of world-leading drug developers to test whether psychedelic drugs – often combined with talking therapy – can offer a new approach to treating a variety of mental health illnesses.
Clerkenwell Health is seeking volunteers for trials that look to find cures for a range of conditions, including PTSD, depression, alcohol use disorder and anorexia.
Many of the conditions have few successful treatment options and Clerkenwell’s innovative methods of combining psychedelics with therapy aim to to treat these problems more holistically, providing long-term quality of life for patients.
Chief Scientific Officer at Clerkenwell Health, Dr Henry Fisher, said: “With the current system for treating mental health disorders simply not working, we’re calling for patients to help identify the next wave of treatments.
“These have the potential to be groundbreaking for the millions of people across the UK who are affected by poor mental health.
“The status quo for mental health treatment has not only resulted in patients experiencing debilitating side-effects, huge waiting lists and high relapse rates, but is costly, complicated and broadly ineffective.
“By participating in upcoming clinical trials, patients have an opportunity to make a valuable contribution to growing research which will support the development of the next generation treatments for mental health conditions.”
According to MIND, approximately 1 in 4 people in the UK will be affected by a mental health condition each year and with a significant rise in people contacting mental health services in recent years, there has never been a more desperate need to identify new and innovative treatments.
Given the challenges facing the country’s health service and with mental health challenges on the rise, the search for volunteers to test effective treatments has never been more pressing.
Clerkenwell has stated, in this regard, that it has gone national with its search for volunteers in an effort to deliver medical breakthroughs in mental health akin to the Polio clinical trials in the 20th Century.
Recent Articles
- Mapping the effects of ketamine on the brain
- Psychedelic therapy programmes launch to address heartbreak, burnout and more
- Psilocybin analogue shows positive results in Phase 2 depression study
- Ketamine: understanding the K-Hole
- Mychedelica launches to revolutionise psychedelic medicine
- Clerkenwell Health calls for volunteers to support groundbreaking psychedelic research
Trending
- Psychedelic therapy programmes launch to address heartbreak, burnout and more
- Psilocybin analogue shows positive results in Phase 2 depression study
- Ketamine: understanding the K-Hole
- Mychedelica launches to revolutionise psychedelic medicine
- Clerkenwell Health calls for volunteers to support groundbreaking psychedelic research
Trending
- Opinion2 years ago
Clerkenwell Health is launching a free UK psychedelic therapist training programme
- Insight2 years ago
Mixing psychedelics with lithium poses significant risk of seizures
- Medicinal2 years ago
MDMA therapy for PTSD granted innovation passport by UK
- Research2 years ago
LSD trial for the treatment of adult ADHD initiated
- Markets & Industry12 months ago
Where can I find training for psychedelic therapy?
- Medicinal2 years ago
MDMA: the love drug?
- News2 years ago
Awakn’s second psychedelic therapy clinic to open in London
- Research2 years ago
London to host Europe’s first commercial psychedelic clinical trial facility