Psyched: Numinus, MindMed, Cybin Reach Milestones, Harvard To Study Psychedelics Law, Michael Pollan Dives Into Mescaline

Michael Pollan’s New Book Takes A Deep Dive Into Mescaline – Will This Be A Turning Point For The Recognition And Study of Mescaline?

Renowned author and journalist Michael Pollan has released a new book called "This is Your Mind on Plants," in which he explores three different mind-changing substances: caffeine, opioids and mescaline.

Pollan became one of the world’s most prominent advocates for the therapeutic use of psychedelics after the 2018 release of “How To Change Your Mind,” his best-selling book that became a seminal piece in the public’s shift of perception around psychedelics.

In his new book, Pollan explores a self-exploratory path into mescaline, a psychedelic substance found in Peyote and the San Pedro cacti, which are considered among the “classic psychedelics,” but seldom come up in scientific research.

Looking at clinical trials in the psychedelics space, mescaline takes a less than a secondary role in the “psychedelics renaissance,” behind other substances like psilocybin and LSD.

Based on Pollan’s influence, could his new book sprout interest into mescaline from the public, the scientific community and commercial psychedelics companies?

Only time will tell, but this could very well be the break mescaline needs to takes its place in the psychedelics conversation.

Harvard Launches Psychedelics Law Research Project

The Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology and Bioethics at Harvard Law School has inaugurated a three-year initiative to study the ethical, legal and social implications of psychedelics commercialization and therapeutic use.

The Project on Psychedelics Law and Regulation (POPLAR) will center on promoting safety, innovation and equity in the psychedelics space.

“Despite the proliferation of clinical research centers, increasing private investment in psychedelic drug development, and widespread state and local decriminalization, there is a relative lack of research on the ethical, legal, and social implications of psychedelics research, commerce, and therapeutics,” said a press release from the institution.

The POPLAR team will tackle these issues by publishing academic research and hosting academic events with experts from industry, government and academia.

The project intends to educate courts, legislators, government agencies and the public while partnering with clinical researchers to help them navigate legal and ethical conundrums in their work.

Psilocybin Could Generate New Neural Connections, A Yale Study Suggests

A new animal study published by scientists at Yale University suggests that psilocybin spurs the growth of neural connections lost in depression.

In the study published in the journal Neuron, mice that were given a single dose of psilocybin showed an immediate and long-lasting increase in connections between neurons.

“We not only saw a 10% increase in the number of neuronal connections, but also they were on average about 10% larger, so the connections were stronger as well,” said Yale’s Alex Kwan, associate professor of psychiatry and of neuroscience and senior author of the paper.

The changes were found to still be present one month after the administration of psilocybin.

The Milestone Round:

Tryp Therapeutics TRYP TRYPF announced a new agreement with the University of Michigan to research the company’s program on psilocybin for neuropsychiatric disorders. 

Numinus Wellness Inc. NUMI announced an agreement to purchase the Neurology Centre of Toronto, a multi-disciplinary neurology clinic, with the aim of transforming it into a specialized center for the application of psychedelics in the field of neurology. The CA$500.000 ($400.000) purchase will be divided between CA$300,000 in cash and CA$200,000 in Numinus shares.

MindMed MNMD announced a new partnership with Datavant, Inc., a data company for the healthcare industry. MindMed will leverage Datavant’s “data linking technology” to avoid data fragmentation and “create broad and detailed datasets to better understand the real-world treatment, service utilization, and healthcare experiences of patients.”

Reset Pharmaceuticals, Inc. has acquired exclusive global rights to develop and commercialize intellectual property from NYU Langone Health’s research on the use of psychedelics for the treatment of mental illness in patients with life-threatening diseases, such as cancer.

Cybin Inc. CYBN CLXPF has inked an exclusive research and development agreement with Greenbrook TMS Inc. GTMS GBNH, a company that operates 129 outpatient mental health service centers in the United States. The partnership will leverage Greenbrook’s extensive patient base to advance clinical research on compounds from Cybin’s pipeline and to facilitate the recruitment of participants for upcoming clinical trials.