🫠 This Week in Psychedelics

Welcome to Tricycle Day. We’re the psychedelics newsletter that breaks through the noise with dank memes. And while we have your attention…

Here’s what we got this week.

Hey, you. Straighten your spine. (We need to practice for next month.)

On October 15-17, we’re headed to Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics for its 19th annual conference. And this event is happening at a historic landmark befitting the occasion, so no slouching.

The New York Academy of Medicine has been preserving rare books and artifacts on the Upper East Side since 1847.

So if the opportunity to meet leaders across psychedelic science, medicine, policy, and culture weren’t motivating enough…

How could you resist that lacquered mahogany?

Out of pocket: Group psilocybin therapy in Oregon’s model appears to be effective for low-income participants with depression.
Couples who roll together… In the first trial of MDMA-assisted therapy for veterans with PTSD and their partners, couples experienced large improvements in relationship functioning.
Always be tekkin’: Psilocin produces fewer side effects than psilocybin.
Whip it good: Nitrous oxide may cause altered visuals by reorganizing large-scale integrative brain networks.
Dig your heels in: Psychedelics don’t always increase cognitive flexibility. Sometimes insights are rigid.

Spill the tea: Healing Advocacy Fund is asking participants of Colorado and Oregon’s psilocybin programs to share their stories to support public education and advocacy.
Numbers don’t lie: Oregon Psilocybin Services has published Q2 2026 data on its dashboard.
On a mission: Marine Corps vet and executive director of the nonprofit Healing Breakthrough argues psilocybin treatment could save veterans’ lives.
The sniff test: The National Institute on Drug Abuse has awarded a $623,000 grant to a clinic in Virginia to investigate whether psilocybin can treat cocaine use disorder.

X factor: Elon Musk’s inner circle is pouring cash into making psychedelics mainstream.
Congrats: Psilocybin drug developer Compass Pathways was named to Fierce Pharma’s “Fierce 50” list of innovation honorees.
Done deal: Eli Lilly completed its acquisition of AtaiBeckley. (See previous coverage.)
Abundance mindset: Philanthropic donors are funding the next frontier of psychedelic medicine.
USA! USA! The American Legion, one of the nation’s largest veteran service organizations, adopted a resolution backing the use of psychedelic therapies.

Yuuuge mistake: Don’t take the Trump-shaped ecstasy pills.
Feel the burn: Missed Burning Man this year? Experience Black Rock City vicariously through 43 surreal photos.
Sitar sound bath: Indian classical music has analgesic properties.
Meme of the week: How I sleep at night knowing people don’t approve of my psychedelic use…

Cancer sucks. We'll go out on a limb and call that statement uncontroversial.

Our spicier take is that psychedelics can help. And not just on the mental health side.

Yes, there's a heaping stack of evidence that psilocybin can ease the existential anxiety and depression that accompany a cancer diagnosis. But that's not what this week's hottest psychedelic paper is about.

It’s about chemotherapy, and how psilocybin could prevent one if its most brutal side effects.

Peripheral neuropathy is the burning, tingling nerve pain chemo leaves behind, sometimes permanently. And researchers at MD Anderson claim to have blocked it entirely (in mice, at least) by preemptively treating them with psilocybin.

If you’re not a cancer survivor, caregiver, or oncologist, you might not realize how big of a problem this type of pain is. Neuropathy affects ~60% of people on platinum-based chemo, and nothing available today realistically offers more than mild relief.

So, the next step is human trials. MD Anderson's Phase 2 NeuroGuard study, set to launch this fall, will test psilocybin in 80 patients undergoing chemo for breast, colorectal, or head and neck cancer.

Maybe after that, this topic will be less controversial. Maybe. 🫠

Ahhh, the world is healing. More people are going to get to try MDMA. This week, New Zealand's medicines regulator, Medsafe, approved two psychiatrists to prescribe pharmaceutical-grade MDMA to adults with severe PTSD. That authorization makes NZ the second country in the world to set up this legal access pathway.

By “this legal access pathway,” we mean the authorized prescriber scheme Australia pioneered in 2023. Under this framework, specific psychiatrists are pre-approved to prescribe MDMA on an ongoing basis. Compare that to Switzerland's and Canada's special access programs, which have let doctors jump through endless hoops request MDMA for individual patients case by case since 2014 and 2022, respectively. Last year, New Zealand cleared psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression within the same guardrails.

Exciting, yes. But Australia offers a glimpse of what such a pathway produces once it's live. Since its scheme launched in 2023, fewer than 200 patients nationwide have actually received psychedelic treatment. Apparently, a policy win alone doesn’t solve the shortage of trained prescribers, high costs, or a slow per-psychiatrist approval process. But hey, we’ll take the W’s where we can get ‘em.

Yesterday, Definium Therapeutics announced an FDA Breakthrough Therapy designation for DT120, its LSD tablet, in major depressive disorder. Wait, we could’ve sworn the FDA already di… oh right, they did. In March 2024, the company (then called MindMed) landed the psychedelics field’s fourth BTD in generalized anxiety disorder. So the same drug candidate now carries the honor twice. Nbd.

The new designation follows the Phase 3 Emerge study, where a single 100 microgram dose produced an industry-leading 8.1-point improvement on the standard depression scale by week six. (When Definium dropped those data in June, its stock price ripped to high heaven.) Let’s not forget that MDD affects more than 21 million U.S. adults a year, and fewer than a third of patients reach remission on first-line treatments such as SSRIs. No question there’s unmet need in this department.

In a way, this news puts Definium in a league of its own. To be fair, psilocybin has racked up two BTDs thus far (one for treatment-resistant depression, one for MDD) but those were awarded to two different companies developing two different formulations. DT120 is the first single drug candidate to pull off the double. Don’t blow it, guys.

That’s all for today, Cyclists! Whenever you’re ready, here’s how we can help.

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DISCLAIMER: This newsletter is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice. The use, possession, and distribution of psychedelic drugs are illegal in most countries and may result in criminal prosecution.