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Science

An Amazonian Tea May Stimulate the Formation of New Brain Cells (medicalxpress.com) 53

Posted by EditorDavid from the if-you're-a-mouse dept.
Popular Mechanics writes: In a new study, researchers found the traditional psychoactive drug ayahuasca stimulates the growth of new brain cells in the hippocampi of research mice. The hippocampus is responsible for many memory functions, and the mice dosed with ayahuasca also performed better in a battery of memory tests.

While ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic and often purgative tea brewed from leaves of a shrub that grows in South America, contains the psychoactive compound N, N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT), it also packs harmine and tetrahydoharmine, two compounds that form new neurons from stem cells in a petri dish, per IFL Science.
"The study, published in Translational Psychiatry, a Nature Research journal, reports the results of four years of in vitro and in vivo experimentation on mice..." according to one medical news site.

José Ángel Morales, a researcher in the UCM and CIBERNED Department of Cellular Biology, tells them "This capacity to modulate brain plasticity suggests that it has great therapeutic potential for a wide range of psychiatric and neurological disorders, including neurodegenerative diseases." In neurodegenerative diseases, it is the death of certain types of neurons that causes the symptoms of pathologies such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Although humans have the capacity to generate new neuronal cells, this depends on several factors and is not always possible.

"The challenge is to activate our dormant capacity to form neurons and thus replace the neurons that die as a result of the disease. This study shows that DMT is capable of activating neural stem cells and forming new neurons," concluded Morales.
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An Amazonian Tea May Stimulate the Formation of New Brain Cells More

An Amazonian Tea May Stimulate the Formation of New Brain Cells

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  • âoeThese creatures you call mice you see are not quite as they appear, they are merely the protrusions into our dimension of vast, hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings.âoe

  • REALLY ?!
    Do you think this drug only works when imbibed as tea ?
    Or do you think that's IRRELEVANT ?!

    • Re:"Tea" ? So the drug alone does nothing ? (Score:4, Funny)

      by RandomUsername99 ( 574692 ) on Saturday November 14, 2020 @04:15PM (#60724772)

      Speaking of beverages, looks like somebody had a biiit too much coffee today.

    • One of the plants involved is I think a woody vine or tree bark that your stomach won't digest on its own, so you have to boil it in water first. Add to that, there are multiple different plants required in the tea blend. You need the DMT from the one plant, and the MAOIs from another plant to alter your metabolism so the DMT doesn't get broken down before it reaches your brain.

      It's also possible to smoke DMT, but the extraction process for that is more complicated than boiling water. From what I hear, you

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by yarbo ( 626329 )
        Difficulty of finding a glass pipe will depend on your area, but many head shops will have an oil screen (for cannabis extract, but work fine for DMT) to fit into your vaporizer. There are dried herb vaporizers that will work like the yocan evolve. You can also use the super cheap oil burner (known for meth/crack).

    • Well, it is likely that a chemical has vastly different effects if it comes with other chemicals. Enzymes/catalysts being a prime example.
      But also how black tea's cafferine gets retarded by the tannins. Hence letting it steep longer causing a milder but longer lasting effect. And milk binds those tannins so it's strong again.

      It is in fact one of the main reason manufactured food is so unhealthy. E.g. fructose in an apple is an entirely different thing than pure fructose. Eggs with a glass of milk are an ent

  • Even if the neuron grows back - that doesn’t necessarily mean the memory will or that even certain motor functions would come back.

    The capacity would (hopefully) return so they might be retrained but I’m not sure that would be an automatic conclusion.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by BAReFO0t ( 6240524 )

      That's not the point though. The point is that usually, the older you become, the less plasticity will be left. Aka ability of the neuron links to change and neurons to grow. This is why elderly people can perfectly remember childhood memories, but have trouble remembering what they did five minutes ago.

      If this stuff allows to reverse that, we'd have *massive* changes in our society. Suddenly, you could do mental work and function well, no matter how old you are.

      And that's not even the best part!

      See, the ma

      • Mdma assisted psychotherapy is also a thing, working along the same principles. I havenâ(TM)t heard, but it would be interesting tonsee how sensory therapies like emdr also work with psychedile tx.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      Long term memories are believed to be stored in the neocortex, although the hippocampus plays an important role in storing those memories.

      We can't automatically know the significance of new cells growth; after all, a brain tumor grows lots of brain cells but doesn't do anything for function. However since I took neuroscience forty years ago we've learned that the brain's structure is far more dynamic than anyone had ever expected.

      Back then our knowledge of brain anatomy came from dissecting dead brains. T

    • I am not aware of any studies showing a real and measurable effect from claimed neurogenesis. Also, there are many things claimed to increase adult neurogenesis (with some support from stuff like rat models). A quick google gave me this TED talk at the top https://www.ted.com/talks/sand... [ted.com] and this quote:

      So activity impacts neurogenesis, but that's not all. What you eat will have an effect on the production of new neurons in the hippocampus. So here we have a sample of diet — of nutrients that have been shown to have efficacy. And I'm just going to point a few out to you: Calorie restriction of 20 to 30 percent will increase neurogenesis. Intermittent fasting — spacing the time between your meals — will increase neurogenesis. Intake of flavonoids, which are contained in dark chocolate or blueberries, will increase neurogenesis. Omega-3 fatty acids, present in fatty fish, like salmon, will increase the production of these new neurons. Conversely, a diet rich in high saturated fat will have a negative impact on neurogenesis. Ethanol — intake of alcohol — will decrease neurogenesis. However, not everything is lost; resveratrol, which is contained in red wine, has been shown to promote the survival of these new neurons.

      Does ayahuasca stimulate more neuron growth than intermittent fasting, eating chocolate etc? Is the effect big enough to make a practical difference? It is too early to tell what any of this actually means.

  • Ayahuasca as a therapy reminds me of an old Bill Murray comedy from the 90â(TM)s. Bill Murrayâ(TM)s character âBobâ(TM) is cured of his many neuroses by a series of haphazard and dangerous experiences - the climax being tied up in rope with an explosive attached, as a now-psychotic therapist tries to blow Bob up in an effort to escape Bobâ(TM)s unrelenting and unwelcome presence on a family vacation. Bob narrowly misses being blown up by figuring out that the rope represents his tan

  • They need to research this and spare the plant (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dasher42 ( 514179 ) on Saturday November 14, 2020 @04:15PM (#60724770)

    The plants involved in Amazonian ayahuasca recipes are becoming threatened, they are so over-harvested now. If you are obviously foreign on the streets of Cusco, they hawk it to you like cigarettes. It's a power tool, and it needs to be in professional hands, not recklessly blitzed. These compounds used in the right dosage are powerfully therapeutic and neuroregenerative, and people with PTSD, depression, and nervous system injuries desperately need that kind of help.

    So I don't want to see hype, of which there's been plenty with regards to ayahuasca. I want to see research and I want to see medicine derived from it, because right now, the plants and the cultures tied to them are being overexploited to death.

    • The more scientists know about it, the more they can start growing it in labs maybe?

      • I'm thinking that as marijuana is legalized/decriminalized in more states, the contraband mildly-psychoactive plant-based pharmaceutical niche is losing a major player. Nature abhors a vaccuum, so there you go :-)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by yarbo ( 626329 )

        DMT (the active ingredient in P. viridis) can be made in a lab or extracted from many other plants like M. hostilis or A. confusa and the MAOIs (active ingredient in B. caapi) can also be made in a lab or extracted from other plants like P. harmala.

        Synthetic routes were published in TiHKaL.

    • Uuum, just don't harvest it in the wild, but breed it at your place?

      If it is available everywhere, "they" can't "hawk" it to you anymore.

      This is a non-issue.

      • Uuum, just don't harvest it in the wild, but breed it at your place?

        If it is available everywhere, "they" can't "hawk" it to you anymore.

        This is a non-issue.

        It should be a non-issue, but you need only look at what's happening in Peru to see the problem. That's how poverty, tourism, and environmental damage converge.

  • LTTeaStore.com ?

    • Wait a minute, why does that domain name exist? Someone's trolling Linus?

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward

        The @ domain goes back to http://redirect.center/ [redirect.center] which then forwards to searching honeybush tea on Amazon.com

    • Leads to a "honeybush tea" search on Amazon.

      1. honeybush is not ayahuasca.
      2. I don't fuckin buy from Amazon, so fuck off.

      • I wrote that URL as a joke, I didn't know it actually worked. As I asked above, is someone trolling Linus? (he owns LTTstore.com)

  • The hippocampus is responsible for many memory functions, and the mice dosed with ayahuasca also performed better in a battery of memory tests.

    "Dammit! I better remember all this stuff in this dumb test or they'll stick another huge needle in me again! Although, I do somehow now have a much stronger memory of how afraid I am of needles, so maybe there's something to it?"

  • Check out the big brain on Brad! Too bad he spends all of his time tripping to be productive.

  • Drugs are good. Free the drugs! Free drugs for all! Drugs WANT to be free.
  • What I need a a tea the selectively removes some unpleasant memories and allows preservation of those happy memories.
    • I think I've seen this movie. It had non-funny Jim Carrey in it.

    • Well, the brain does not really do "removing" the way you think it does.
      All you can do is make those neurons grow a stronger link to better neurons than the ones that trigger bad *feelings*.

      And trust me, you do NOT want to forget your worst *memory*. Because they you WILL do it *again*. Because your entire personality is set to be somebody who does those things, and that memory is the thing that stops you from doing it again. (Where "doing" includes merely bringing you in a situation like that. Like walking

    • What I need a a tea the selectively removes some unpleasant memories and allows preservation of those happy memories.

      Check out the Nova episode Memory Hackers [pbslearningmedia.org]. In it they discuss a using propanodol to treat phobias, if your memories are unpleasant because of fear a similar treatment might help.

  • https://rutles.fandom.com/wiki... [fandom.com]

    Drink Tea! Drink Tea! Everybody Drink Tea!

  • More harmine stuff? (Score:3)

    by cfalcon ( 779563 ) on Saturday November 14, 2020 @05:44PM (#60725038)

    Harmine was found to regrow pancreas cells a few years ago, possibly helping diabetics. There was a study using some research chemical meant to do the same (profitable because you can patent it). If harmine can regrow brain cells, pancreatic cells, and has some potential protective properties against cancer, is there some reasonable way to take it?

    Last I read on erowid someone made tea from Syrian Rue, but that seemed more to experiment with the hallucinogenic properties or something.

    Will this sit at the edges of society or become something real?

  • Being claimed to produce new brain cells.

    So, how did they count them?

  • Ayahuasca and other drugs like it need to be handled with extreme care and medical expertise.

    Here is an example where someone went on a quest for enlightenment, but ended up dead, with others [newsinteractives.cbc.ca].

    • Powerful hallucinogenic drugs being given to naive and often vulnerable tourists, what could go wrong? At least when kids go on spring break they only end up with an STI and a regrettable tattoo!

  • The "tea" is made from the leaves of *two* distinct plants, neither of which is psychoactive without the other.

  • No amount of fancy-shmansy tea can fix stupid.

  • It's a reverse "Serpent and the Rainbow"

  • Come on editors. You're going to take an article referencing the National Enquirer equivalent of science/engineering?

  • I thought the no new brain cells idea was already debunked last year.

    https://www.scientificamerican... [scientificamerican.com]

  • I'm fascinated to know whether the narcissistic and money-chasing personality types experience any perspective changing moments from any of the spiritual tools they've ripped off over the last few years?! They've turned yoga, mindfulness, LSD etc into career-enhancing tools and it looks like this is next. It's just wrong!
  • I used to drink ayahuasca daily. That's how I got brain cancer.

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