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Psilocybin subdues hypothalamus?


tommyd
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From Nature:

Psychedelic chemical subdues brain activity

Magic mushrooms' active ingredient constrains control centres.

Mo Costandi

23 January 2012

Far from expanding your mind, the hallucinogenic chemical found in magic mushrooms induces widespread decreases in brain activity, researchers report today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences....

...The researchers also observed reduced blood flow to the hypothalamus, and suggest that this explains anecdotal reports that psychedelics alleviate symptoms of cluster headaches, which are associated with increased hypothalamic activity.

However, NuttÂ’s findings conflict with those of other studies.

“We have completed a number of similar studies and we always saw an activation of these same areas,” says Franz Vollenweider at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. “We gave the drug orally and waited an hour, but they administered it intravenously just before the scans, so one explanation is that the effects were not that strong.”

The rest at:

http://www.nature.com/news/psychedelic-chemical-subdues-brain-activity-1.9878

Also a story in the in the Chicago Tribune:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/sns-rt-us-brain-magic-mushroomstre80m20b-20120123,0,1763641.story

And in EurekAlert:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-01/icl-mme012312.php

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