#667: Dr. Gül Dölen on Rethinking Psychedelics, New Applications (Autism, Stroke, and Allergies), The Neurobiology of Beginner’s Mind, Octopuses on MDMA, and The Master Key of Metaplasticity

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Dr. Gül Dölen is an associate professor of
Neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
and a pioneer and world leader of psychedelics research. Her
laboratory has discovered a novel mechanism that could account
for the broad range of therapeutic applications that psychedelics
are currently being tested for. Her lab has discovered a novel
critical period for social reward learning and shown that this
critical period can be reopened with psychedelic drugs, such as
MDMA, LSD, psilocybin, ketamine, and ibogaine. Building on this
discovery, she has formulated the hypothesis that psychedelics
may be the long sought “master key” for unlocking critical
periods across the brain. To test this hypothesis, she has
initiated a nationwide collaborative effort to determine whether
psychedelics reopen critical periods for ocular dominance
plasticity, bird song learning, anatomical plasticity in the
barrel cortex, serotonergic neuronal regeneration, dendritic
spinogenesis, and motor learning.


Importantly, understanding psychedelics through this framework
dramatically expands the scope of disorders (including autism,
stroke, and allergies) that might benefit from adjunct therapy
with psychedelics, an approach she has dubbed the
PHATHOM project (Psychedelic Healing: Adjunct
Therapy Harnessing Opened Malleability). 


Dr. Dölen earned her MD, PhD at Brown University and the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where she carried
out seminal work on critical periods, learning and memory, and
the pathogenesis of autism. 


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[06:25] How Gül designed her own major as an undergrad.


[09:03] Philosophy of mind and theory of mind.


[13:33] What theory of mind in non-human species suggests.


[16:45] The origin of Gül's interest in autism.


[21:37] Autism facts vs. fiction.


[28:31] Critical periods.


[37:59] How critical periods apply to therapies for autism.


[43:37] Why might psychedelics allow us to reopen shut critical
periods?


[49:25] MDMA and the octopus.


[52:40] Challenging popular notions about psychedelic research.


[54:52] Plasticity.


[1:00:26] Favorite neurotransmitter receptors.


[1:06:03] Can psychedelics cure allergies?


[1:14:00] Seeking a common pathway for the therapeutic effects of
psychedelics.


[1:15:54] Potential applications for kappa-opioid agonists.


[1:17:02] Beta-arrestin developments.


[1:20:40] On Sasha Shulgin.


[1:26:19] Strokes.


[1:29:56] Cross-cultural considerations.


[1:33:26] What do these therapies look like 10 years from now?


[1:36:52] Gauging minimum effective dose.


[1:42:58] The funding frustrations that almost made Gül give up
science.


[1:48:44] Taking risks.


[1:52:59] What would Gül change about the way research is funded
today?


[1:55:57] Books most gifted.


[1:59:10] Parting thoughts.


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