Psychedelic Brain Science

Join Alaina and Zarmeen in the final episode of Season 1!! They are jumping right into all things microdosing. They'll get into methodology, clinical data, preclinical data and considerations for the field moving forward. Get ready for some strong opinions by self-identified "Microdosing Skeptic" Alaina. Catch the gals on the airwaves again in January for Season 2!

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

Alaina is joined this week by Dr. Lindsay Cameron, a PhD graduate from University San Diego and current post-doc at Stanford. This episode is all about that funny word, psychoplastogens, and how creating new compounds is kind of like taking a part a puzzle and using the pieces to make something new. Dr. Cameron talks about her work as a PhD student and the future directions of the field of psychedelics.

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

In this weeks episode Zarmeen kicks off the plasticity mini series with a dive into functional plasticity and current literature in the field. She talks about what exactly plasticity is (we know its been a psychedelic buzzword!) and how it intersects with psychiatric disorders. She also talks about different experimental measures of plasticity and of course, what we know of psychedelics and functional plasticity!

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

In this weeks episode Zarmeen talks to you about the Default Mode Network and its utility in theories of psychedelic action. This episode features special guest Haley Dourron a PhD student in psychology who talks about her Self Entropic Broadening theory which attempts to identify a mechanism for ego dissolution and separate the action of psychedelics from the historical belief that they are only useful as psychotomimetics. 

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

Join Alaina and Zarmeen this week as they celebrate Zarmeen's birthday by diving into the recently published report of a phase 2 clinical trial of psilocybin for treatment resistant depression. They go over some background, methodology and results surrounding the study and what it means moving forward. Of course, they also give their interpretations and discuss thoughts about sensationalism, limitations and the things they liked about the study.

CW: suicidal ideation and self-injury.

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

This week Alaina and Harrison continue their discussion about structure, function and some of the ways we figure out the pharmacological profiles of psychedelic drugs. As Harrison puts it, these drugs are beautiful in their structural simplicity but have some of those most interesting subjective effects. Join the duo and dive into why phenethylamine psychedelics are different from tryptamines and why they act kind of like amphetamines.

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

Join Alaina as she jumps into her favorite topic - how drugs work! She's going to discuss the basics of biology and how the structural and functional characteristics of compounds can determine how psychedelics work. Dr. Harrison Elder, a pharmacologist and Senior Manager of Clinical Development at DeFloria Biosciences, joins Alaina to talk about the difference between tryptamines and ergolines, and how we can measure the function of these different psychedelics. Thanks for listening and as always, subscribe and let us know what you think!

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

Join Alaina and Zarmeen as they discuss the paper titled "Bespoke library docking for 5-HT2A receptor agonists with antidepressant activity" by Kaplan et al., 2022. A very topical paper in which researchers identified new drugs based on structural similarities to LSD that are selective at the 5-HT2A receptor. These compounds show promising antidepressant activity in mice, but seem to have no hallucinogenic activity. They discuss the methods, key findings, and takeaways of this incredible paper!

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

Alaina and Zarmeen finally share their thoughts on the How to Change Your Mind Docuseries.

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.

In this episode of Your Brain on Science, Zarmeen talks about the Hope in psychedelic research! She goes through some landmark clinical studies in psychedelic science, including those investigating the potential therapeutic effect of psychedelics to treat depression and substance use disorders. She also briefly talks about some important concepts like neuroplasticity and entropy, which will be covered in more detail later. Let us know what you're feeling hopeful for as psychedelic science continues to move forward. As always, like our content, subscribe and share with your friends!

The content of YBOS is the opinion of the authors and does not reflect the opinion of others or author affiliations.