Spannende Kiste: Eine Untersuchung dessen, was LSD während seiner Wirkung im Kopf tatsächlich auslöst. Gab es so noch nicht. Jetzt versucht man die Kosten für eine derartige Studie per Crowdfunding zusammen zu bekommen, was bereits schon jetzt geschafft ist. Ich freue mich auf das Ergebnis dessen, was dabei herauskommen wird. Kümmert sich ja sonst keiner drum.
Why is it important to understand how psychedelics work in the brain?
The main purpose of the imaging study is to determine how LSD works on the human brain to produce its characteristic psychological effects. This question has never been addressed before. Understanding more about the physiological effects of LSD will help us shed light on potential medical interventions as well as help us learn more about consciousness. In many respects how the brain works is still a mystery. By researching how psychedelics work, we will be a step closer to understanding how specific areas of the brain are affected to induce certain psychological effects.What are you trying to discover through this research? What could the results show?
We recently carried out a brainimaging study of the key ingredient in magic mushrooms, psilocybin. It showed that psilocybin plays a role in the Default Mode Network (DMN), which is an area of the brain that has been implicated in cases of depression, OCD, Alzheimer’s, and autism. In particular, this research has raised interest in the investigation of psilocybin as a possible treatment for depression. We suspect that LSD works in a similar way to psilocybin, but we will not know for certain until we have analysed the results of the brain imaging study.
