science

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A rarely seen deep sea fish resembling a serpent was found floating dead on the ocean surface off the San Diego coast and was brought ashore for study, marine experts said.

They were able to adapt to any challenge – until they met us.

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/39625050

But Marks points out that the FDA typically follows the advice of its independent advisory committees — and the one that evaluated MDMA in June overwhelmingly voted against approving the drug, citing problems with clinical trial design that the advisers felt made it difficult to determine the drug’s safety and efficacy. One concern was about the difficulty of conducting a true placebo-controlled study with a hallucinogen: around 90% of the participants in Lykos’s trials guessed correctly whether they had received the drug or a placebo, and the expectation that MDMA should have an effect might have coloured their perception of whether it treated their symptoms.

Another concern was about Lykos’s strategy of administering the drug alongside psychotherapy. Rick Doblin, founder of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), the non-profit organization that created Lykos, has said that he thinks the drug’s effects are inseparable from guided therapy. MDMA is thought to help people with PTSD be more receptive and open to revisiting traumatic events with a therapist. But because the FDA doesn’t regulate psychotherapy, the agency and advisory panel struggled to evaluate this claim. “It was an attempt to fit a square peg into a round hole,” Marks says.

Cane toads are at it again! Scientists from Macquarie University working with Bunuba Indigenous rangers and the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) in Western Australia have trialed a new way to protect freshwater crocodiles from deadly invasive cane toads spreading across northern Australia.