Discovery Sessions San Francisco convened on Bicycle Day weekend in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco for their third annual celebration of the psychedelic underground. Luminaries from across eras and time zones flocked to the Bay Area for an open exchange of ideas, spirited debate, and potent mushroom chocolate in the decriminalized safe harbor of the City by the Bay. It seems like you can flip open a calendar to a random date these days and there will be some sort of psychedelic conference happening somewhere. How Discovery Sessions manages to carve out a unique lane and stand out fr ..read more

The following is excerpted from Blotter: the Untold Story of an Acid Medium (MIT Press), the first comprehensive cultural history of LSD blotter paper. The village of East Hagbourne lies not far from Oxford, England, and it is here, according to the town website at least, that proprietors of a local paper mill first discovered blotting paper. Stories and dates vary, but it seems that sometime in the closing years of the eighteenth century, an improperly sized batch of paper — or possibly an accidental spill of sulfuric acid — resulted in a highly absorbent product. William Russell Slade, one o ..read more

This article is the second in a series from the Co-founder and President of the Center for MINDS (Multidisciplinary Investigation into Novel Discoveries and Solutions). To read the first article, click here.  I have long been convinced that the mind-manifesting powers of psychedelics have the potential to help humanity meet its greatest scientific, technical and leadership challenges. By illustration, I can offer my own example. Using psychedelics interwoven with other practices, I tackled one of science’s major mysteries: How did life begin?  The result is a widely cited hypothesis ..read more

The underground market for psychedelic vapes has reached a fever pitch. Democratization of psychedelic chemistry and extraction methods, coupled with ubiquitously available and cheaply manufactured disposable vaporizer technology, has packed the most powerful known psychoactive substances into portable devices so readily available that the recently released 2024 major motion picture, The Beekeeper, features a scene where a young man casually derides his mother for mistaking his DMT vape for a nicotine vape.  Vaporizers containing DMT, psilocybin, 2C-B, and various other substances deliver ..read more

It is no surprise that in recent years the use of psychedelics has been on the rise, as some 20 cities and states have decriminalized once-prohibited plants and fungi, and the FDA moves toward approving psychedelic-assisted therapies. But has that increase had any implications for public health? A new report suggests that there are public health consequences. The study, which was funded by the Health Services Research Administration Stanford Addiction Medicine Fellowship program, looked at “Trends in hallucinogen-associated emergency department visits and hospitalizations in California, USA fr ..read more

Last June, the American Psychedelic Practitioners Association appointed a new executive director whose background many in the psychedelic field found surprising. Few would have expected that APPA might be led by a former three-star general. But then they probably didn’t know much about Brigadier General (Ret.) Stephen N. Xenakis.  Xenakis first emerged as an advocate for psychedelic therapy as co-founder of Reason for Hope, an organization that promotes legal reforms to support access to psychedelic medicine. A clinical psychiatrist who has advised the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staf ..read more

This article is the first in a series from the Co-founder and President of the Center for MINDS (Multidisciplinary Investigation into Novel Discoveries and Solutions).  The modern dawn of psychedelics in the 1950s and 60s saw profound, ancient potions rediscovered and newly distilled in the laboratory, then shrink-wrapped for mass consumption. Before the dosing of millions of youthful Boomer minds came a decade of quieter, more contemplative exploration by some of the leading thinkers and figures of the day. These included writer Aldous Huxley, congresswoman Clare Boothe Luce, and actor C ..read more

Since its founding ten years ago, the MAPS Public Benefit Corporation has been wholly owned by the nonprofit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, the advocacy organization founded by Rick Doblin to support psychedelic drug research and policy reform. In December, the for-profit MAPS PBC completed Phase 3 clinical trials for MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD, and became the first company to submit a New Drug Application to the FDA for a psychedelic-assisted therapy.  MAPS raised $140 million to fund this effort through philanthropy, as well as additional capital through inve ..read more

In a move certain to have a wider impact on the development of psychedelic-assisted therapies, the MAPS Public Benefit Corporation announced Tuesday that it has filed an application to the FDA for MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD. This is the first submission of a new drug application for any psychedelic-assisted therapy.  PTSD affects approximately 13 million Americans each year, but available treatments are only modestly effective. In 2014, the MAPS nonprofit organization created the for-profit MAPS Public Benefit Corporation to continue research and education around the development of in ..read more

In the first part of this two-part series, Chris Kilham visits the Sonoran Desert to investigate the sustainability and collection of Bufo alvarius toads by Mexico’s indigenous Seri people for the harvesting of 5-MeO-DMT. To read part one, click here. Estacion Torres Under a bright moon we follow our armed escorts for a few miles, spotting toads hopping about here and there and avoiding glistening puddles of great size, eventually arriving at a colorful and brightly lit sign announcing their village, Estacion Torres. In the early 1900’s, the village became an important center for mining gold a ..read more