🫠 This Week in Psychedelics

Welcome to Tricycle Day. We’re the psychedelics newsletter that believes in the scientific method. Our hypothesis? You’ll love today’s issue enough to share it with at least one person. (Don’t make us reject it as null. 🤞)

Here’s what we got this week.

• A trippier Theory of Mind 💡

• Massachusetts ballot initiative 🗳️

• Has the psychedelic bubble burst? 🫧

• The Pacific shrub that relieves anxiety 🌿

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RESEARCH

A psychedelic theory of mind

We all know psychedelics can help us change our minds (Thanks, Michael Pollan 👌). But how they do it remains somewhat of a mystery.

This week, researchers poked some gaping holes in the prevailing explanation—that psychedelics work by deactivating the so-called Default Mode Network (DMN).

According to these guys and gals, that idea’s WRONG (... or at least incomplete). Psychedelics don’t turn off the DMN. Aaaackshually, they activate certain parts of it, which are also involved in another network called Theory of Mind (ToM).

All these brain buzzwords are enough to make your head spin, so let’s break it down.

• 🤤 The Default Mode Network (DMN) is active during periods of daydreaming and introspection, when you’re NOT engaged in outward tasks that demand your attention.

• 🫂 The Theory of Mind (ToM) network is involved in social cognition, the mental process that allows us to figure out what other people are thinking and feeling.

Now here’s what our contrarian friends are telling us:

• Psychedelics light up certain brain regions shared by the DMN and ToM

• Two brain functions that come from that overlapping area are autobiographical memories (which psychedelics can induce) and self-perspective (which psychedelics can change)

• It’s possible that social cognition is the “default mode” of thinking for human beings (we’re social creatures after all)

• Psychedelics may have therapeutic potential for autism spectrum disorders, and other conditions marked by impaired social cognition

So welcome back, DMN. It’s good to have you online. 🧠

MICRODOSES

😵‍💫 You’re getting very sleepy: A recent study compared the brains of people who’d taken psychedelics to those of others who were either meditating or hypnotized.

🍄 The beginning of the end: Cybin has started dosing the sixth and final cohort in the Phase II trial of its investigational psilocybin drug for major depression.

☔ Pain, pain, go away: The U.S. military is testing a wearable ketamine device to deliver pain relief to soldiers in contested environments.

🧑‍🎓 Back to school: UC Berkeley is offering a free online course on Psychedelics and the Mind.

POLICY

Colorado, Oregon, and… Massachusetts?

Massholes are gonna need a new nickname after this news.

A group of activists has officially filed not one but two ballot initiatives that would legalize psychedelics in the state of Massachusetts. If they’re approved, voters will decide whether to pass the initiatives into law next year.

The two filings outline the Natural Psychedelic Substances Act, which would effectively decriminalize and legalize certain psychedelics in one fell swoop.

• 😎 The decrim part: Adults 21+ would be permitted to use, possess, and even share limited quantities of several entheogenic plants and fungi.

• 🧑‍⚕️ The legalization part: The state would establish a framework to license, regulate, and tax businesses offering therapeutic psilocybin services.

The coalition that submitted the paperwork, called Massachusetts for Mental Health Options, is backed by New Approach, the same political action committee (PAC) that funded the campaigns in Colorado and Oregon. So if some of these provisions sound familiar, you know why.

Now they just need 75,000 signatures by December to make it onto next year’s ballot, so Massholes Masstronauts(?) can cast their votes.

Here’s an idea: give out free Dunkin Donuts iced coffee in exchange for one signature.

MICRODOSES

✋ Stop, collaborate, and listen: The Senate Appropriations Committee wants the NIH and FDA to collaborate on public-private partnerships to expand psychedelic research.

🌿 Let the good times roll: Colorado Gov. Jared Polis says the move to legalize cannabis and psychedelics has been very good for the state.

🔔 Cognitive liberty bell: Philadelphia advocates are pushing for city and state-wide decriminalization.

✍️ Up to the task? Members of Minnesota’s new Psychedelic Medicine Task Force are working on a legalization bill that would prioritize criminal justice reform.

👮 Borderline case: US Customs and Border Protection officers seized over 60 pounds of DMT at the Texas-Mexico border.

BUSINESS

The psychedelic shakeout has begun

If a bubble pops while you’re tripping in the woods, does it still make a sound? 🫧💥

Market analysts are pointing out that the once-hyped psychedelic sector is contracting big time. And it may get worse before it gets better.

Case in point: the AdvisorShares Psychedelics ETF, a basket of psychedelic stocks, is down ~56% from its 365-day high last August. Zoom out, and we’re looking at an 81% drop from its all-time high in November 2021.

Total investments in psychedelics are down, too.

• 🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ 2019: $62 million (the boom begins 🤔)

• 🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜ 2020: $617 million (we’re still early 🤑)

• 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 2021: $1.6 billion (peak euphoria 🤩)

• 🟥🟥🟥⬜⬜⬜ 2022: $570 million (buy the dip 🥲)

• 🟥🟥⬜⬜⬜⬜ 2023 prediction: $400 million (max pain 😭)

It’s not looking great. One institutional investor says that half the psychedelic companies that have gone public since 2019 are in the process of selling their IP or shutting down altogether. Ouch.

But there could be light at the end of the kaleidoscopic tunnel. In 2024, there are two big factors that could turn the markets around.

• 📊 Midstage clinical trial results: Many companies haven’t proved their investigational drugs actually work yet. Interim results could make or break their commercial viability.

• 💊 FDA approval of MDMA: If the FDA grants its first psychedelic approval to MAPS for PTSD, that could be the signal big pharma companies need to start gobbling up (suddenly less) risky biotechs.

If you consider yourself an investor, now’s the time to remind yourself of Warren Buffett’s golden rule: Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful.

Or if you’ve always hated the idea of psychedelic pharma, I guess you can just be happy when others get rekt. ☠️

MICRODOSES

📖 Onto the next chapter : Awakn Life Sciences has sold the last of its clinics to focus solely on psychedelic R&D.

✉️ SPACs are back: Psyence has gone public via special purpose acquisition company.

🛣️ My way or the highway: Core One Labs wants to patent a new method of isolating psilocybin from mushroom biomass. Optimi Health has filed a patent application for its own extraction process.

🤝 Roll up: Panacea Life Sciences is acquiring Sierra Sage Herbs, a plant-based first aid brand, and Halucenex, a company researching novel psychedelic compounds.

🇯🇲 From Jamaica, with love: Jamaican psilocybin exporter Rose Hill is expanding its CPG line and launching retreats.

Radiant Farms Kava Gummies — Kava: the psychoactive shrub you’ve probably never heard of. It’s prized in the Pacific Islands for its soothing and calming effects, and now it’s gaining popularity as a natural anti-anxiety supplement in the West. We found the gummy form, because well, who doesn’t love gummies? Enter code TRICYCLE23 at checkout, and you can add a FREE Kava single or Kanna double to your order of any 10-pack.

Ketamine Benefits and Risk — Huberman is on a tear. After covering psilocybin and MDMA, his latest episode dives deep into the neuroscience of ketamine. You might be surprised to learn that the dissociative anesthetic has at least 3(!) different mechanisms of action, responsible for its unique subjective effects and powerful therapeutic response in major depression.

Returning Ancestral Lands to Indigenous Hands — The Amazon isn’t just the cradle of our planet’s biodiversity. It’s also home to indigenous peoples who’ve passed down the wisdom of plant medicine for generations. The Amazon Conservation Team wants to buy and return their territory, but they need help. If this campaign raises $100,000 by tonight at midnight, philanthropist Tim Ferriss and mycologist Paul Stamets will match it with another $50k each.

That’s all for today. Before you head off, don’t forget to share, rate, and review Tricycle Day below. Catch ya next time, Cyclists! ✌️

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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.