DNA Field Trip

On October 20th, 2020, seven intrepid students from Royal Holloway’s Drugs and Alcohol Awareness Campaign (DNA) traversed the 22 miles between Egham and Bethnal Green in east London to attend an unusual talk at the Genesis Theatre. Chris Timmerman, a PhD candidate working with the Psychedelic Research Group at Imperial College, was going to be discussing the ‘Science of Psychedelics’ and all were eager to learn. With composure and a soothing accent Chris began by contextualizing the human use of psychoactive drugs throughout the ages. He noted, to our collective surprise, that one of the most intense of these substances, a compound known chemically as dimethyltryptamine (DMT), has been used by Indigenous cultures in South America for at least 4200 years. Indeed, this was an intriguing start and lead the speaker into a brief history of how psychedelics (from the Greek roots psyche as ‘mind’ and delos as ‘manifesting’) came to be used by psychiatrists and psychologists from the mid 1940’s-1970 as potent tools in the treatment of mental health. Chris said that during the 1960’s alone over 40,000 research subjects participated in 1000+ studies that were published in relation to the therapeutic utility of psychedelic drugs such as LSD and psilocybin (the psychoactive compound in mushrooms).

Scientific interest, as well as many people, was evidently very high during this first ‘age of psychedelic enlightenment’ in the middle part of the last century but, as with all things, this too passed. Following the United States implementation of the Controlled Substances Act in 1970 all further institutional research came to an abrupt halt, with many groundbreaking therapeutic modalities either shelved indefinitely or forced into underground operation. A dark age had certainly descended on psychedelic science and it would take nearly 30 years before the next study could be formally carried out and published in a peer reviewed journal.

At this point Chris took a break and the theatre erupted into excitedly muffled chatter. Scanning the faintly art nouveau setting we noticed that despite COVID restrictions the event was nearly sold out, a compelling sign that -regardless of decades long repression- a psychedelic current was still pulsing through the zeitgeist.

When our speaker resumed he wasted no time and promptly whisked us down his rabbithole of choice: the neuroscience of psychedelics. Sparing the reader some of the more technical points, Chris provided a masterful explanation of one of the most common phenomena reported by research subjects in his recently completed study at Imperial College on DMT. The experience of fractal geometry in the visual field is a distinctive characteristic of high-dose psychedelic experiences and bears a close resemblance to what has been termed ‘sacred geometry’ since the Renaissance. As was explained; Leonardo Da Vinci’s sketches of the Vitruvian man as well as the Fibonacci sequence or ‘golden ratio’ demonstrate a principle which is frequently encountered in the visionary state induced by DMT. One neuroscientific theory that Chris presented in response to this curious similarity is that it has been discovered that the part of the human brain responsible for processing imagery, namely the visual cortex, has a highly geometric structure. This could explain why, in states of altered consciousness, the visual field appears to be made out of geometric patterns - this is then, in a sense, an expression of the brain experiencing its own internal structure.

Chris expanded from these musings into a deeper consideration of what is actually happening to the brain in neuroscientific terms while it is “tripping”. To this end, a rather stunning series of brain image renderings were displayed on the screen behind the speaker's lecturn. Starkly juxtaposed against the placebo subject, a vibrant red to blue gradient seemed to be animating almost every brain region in the LSD sample. Chris explained that an important phenomena seems to consistently arise in relation to such dramatically increased inter-connectivity: a marked uptick in creativity. In fact, the intense neurological dynamism which LSD catalyzes in the brain enables a plethora of novel connections between previously disparate brain regions. These fresh links often lead to a new and perhaps even startling synthesis of internal understanding or, as Chris described it; the experience of insight.

In light of these remarkable findings, researchers at Imperial College as well as other leading academic institutions such as Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore have resurrected the long dormant practice of clinically studying the efficacy of psychedelic psychotherapy. Trials using psilocybin for both the treatment of major depression and end of life anxiety have produced paradigms shifting results, sending shock-waves through a deeply entrenched psychiatric model of mental health heavily geared toward the suppression of symptoms. Here Chris made an important point of emphasizing an essential shift in the perception of mental illness which the findings of psychedelic medicine invites us to embrace. Ultimately we cannot run away from our problems, spending one’s life dependent on pharmaceuticals designed to alleviate immediate suffering is not a path toward authentic healing and wholeness. Psychedelic psychotherapy offers us the opportunity to turn and face our rawest truth, moving through it’s pain as a personal rite of passage, emerging on the other side as a more deeply integrated and loving individual. This is not a “take one and call me in the morning” approach to mental health, rather it is an intense and embodied encounter with layers of one’s being often shrouded in darkness - a heroic effort to oneself within a safe and psychologically professional container.

The talk came to a close with resounding applause, it felt as if an hour and a half had passed in the blink of an eye. As we filed out of the theatre our group was filled with more questions than answers and passionate conversation gripped us under the soft neon of the entrance way. Chris’s work with Imperial and the burgeoning field of psychedelic science is certainly paving the way into a technicolor future where science and the mysterious realm of the psyche might finally be able to dance into a new day-glow dawn.

• To learn more about the work that the Psychedelic Research Group is undertaking at Imperial College please see: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/psychedelic-research-centre/

• Check out Fever Up to attend a Science of Psychedelics talk:https://feverup.com/london/fever-talks (Next event online event is November 27th)

Disclaimer: DNA does not condemn or condone the use of drugs or alcohol, we are a student lead harm reduction group committed to providing education and support to the Royal Holloway study body.