New Psychoactive Natural Products

Dear Colleagues,

According to the WHO, traditional medicine is “the sum total of the knowledge, skill, and practices based on the theories, beliefs, and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or not, used in the maintenance of health as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement or treatment of physical and mental illness”. There are many different systems of traditional medicine, and their philosophy and practices have distinct influences. A common principle is a holistic approach to life, with a balance between the mind, body, and environment, and an emphasis on processes that restore and maintain health, rather than on disease.

Natural products are, in general, rich in a variety of compounds; many of them are secondary metabolites, aromatic and non-aromatic substances. About 200 years ago, the first pharmacologically active pure compound, the isoquinoleic alkaloid morphine, was extracted from the seed pods of the opium poppy Papaver somniferum L. Similarly, the psilocybin (4-phosphoryloxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine), a secondary metabolite produced by several groups of fungi and widely associated with rituals in ancient times, is extremely helpful for furthering our understanding of how brain activity relates to altered states of consciousness. Many compounds have been isolated from natural sources, demonstrating that drugs from plants and fungi could be purified and administered in precise dosages.

The potential therapeutic application of natural matrices is extremely dependent on the chemical class(es) of their compounds. The research of psychoactive natural products, both alone and in mixtures of different species, has expanded in recent years. Understanding the mechanisms underlying these effects in brain function could potentially provide insights regarding the application of novel therapeutic approaches to various brain diseases and disorders.

Authors are welcome to submit their research addressing natural products with psychoactive properties. Some suggested topics are as follows:

- Identifying new clinical applications of psychoactive natural products
- Probing the neural mechanisms of action underlying psychological manifestations, at functional and molecular levels
- Drug delivery strategies
- Potentially addictive properties of psychoactive drugs
- Applications in pain research.

Prof. Dr. Célia Cabral
Prof. Dr. Miguel Castelo-Branco
Prof. Dr. Anabela Marisa Azul
Guest Editors

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• neuropharmacology
• brain imaging
• etnopharmacology
• natural products
• drug delivery