Draulio Araujo, professor at the Brain Institute in the University of Rio Grande Norte in Natal, Brazil, has been studying ayahuasca for more than 20 years. It’s a psychedelic plant used in rituals in South America that has also been researched for its potential to treat depression. The effects of ayahuasca can last for hours and also lead to side effects including vomiting and diarrhea. The active psychedelic drug in ayahuasca is DMT, and so Dr. Araujo and his colleagues decided to conduct the first test of DMT itself, which is also an endogenous chemical and has been demonstrated to be safe.

Read the full article here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-025-02091-6

This episode features a conversation with Senior Investigator Avroy Fanaroff, Emeritus Professor at Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, who has had a long and impactful career in neonatology.

Listen to March's Pediapod episode: What's hot in pediatric sepsis research, with Sarah Kandil and Eleanor Molloy.

Best student paper of 2024 winner Kate Rick, along with Brenton Von Takach and Kym Ottewell, discuss the use of genomics in Australian conservation efforts, and their study on the golden bandicoot.

New drugs that target the endocannabinoid system are being proposed for disorders that are usually characterized by the dysregulation of social processing, like social anxiety disorder and autism spectrum disorder. Researchers have been trying to understand the mechanisms for how these drugs work.

Leah Mayo is assistant professor at the University of Calgary, and she’s one of the authors of a new study in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology in which they examined two aspects of the system. One is the endocannabinoid system itself. And then there’s another aspect of social processing called the C tactile system.

Read the full study here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-025-02053-y

Chérine Baumgartner and Andy Foote discuss working with orcas and their recent paper on diet and population dynamics in North Atlantic killer whales

Listen to January's Pediapod episode: What's hot in pediatric microbiome research, with Namasivayam Ambalavanan.

Listen to November's Pediapod episode: What's hot in Pediatric Oncology? with Jeffrey Dome

Listen to January's Pediapod episode: Conversation With Senior Investigator Karin Nelson

Katja Guschanski discusses working with mammal evolution, museomics and her plenary talk at Popgroup 2025