Ambassadors

Rick Doblin, Ph.D., is the founder and executive director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). He received his doctorate in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, where he wrote his dissertation on the regulation of the medical uses of psychedelics and marijuana and his Master’s thesis on a survey of oncologists about smoked marijuana vs. the oral THC pill in nausea control for cancer patients.

His undergraduate thesis at New College of Florida was a 25-year follow-up to the classic Good Friday Experiment, which evaluated the potential of psychedelic drugs to catalyze religious experiences. He also conducted a thirty-four year follow-up study to Timothy Leary’s Concord Prison Experiment. Rick studied with Dr. Stanislav Grof and was among the first to be certified as a Holotropic Breathwork practitioner. His professional goal is to help develop legal contexts for the beneficial uses of psychedelics and marijuana, primarily as prescription medicines but also for personal growth for otherwise healthy people, and eventually to become a legally licensed psychedelic therapist. He founded MAPS in 1986, and currently resides in Boston with his wife and empty rooms from three children who are all in college or recently graduated.

Our dear friend and one of our beloved Mind Medicine Australia Ambassadors passed away. We will all miss his wisdom, love and compassion so very much. What a legacy he has left behind. Let us all light thousands of candles to honour and remember him and keep him in our hearts.

Roland Griffiths, Ph.D., is Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neurosciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His principal research focus in both clinical and pre-clinical laboratories has been on the behavioural and subjective effects of mood-altering drugs. His research has been largely supported by grants from the National Institute on Health and he is author of 380 journal articles and book chapters. He has been a consultant to the National Institutes of Health, to numerous pharmaceutical companies in the development of new psychotropic drugs, and as a member of the Expert Advisory Panel on Drug Dependence for the World Health Organization.

He has conducted extensive research with sedative-hypnotics, caffeine, and novel mood-altering drugs. In 1999 he initiated a research program investigating the effects of the classic psychedelic psilocybin that includes studies in psychedelic naive and experienced volunteers, in beginning and long-term meditators, and in religious leaders.

Studies have also have examined the effects of salvinorin A, dextromethorphan, and ketamine which produce altered states of consciousness having some similarities to psilocybin.  Therapeutic studies with psilocybin include treatment of psychological distress in cancer patients, treatment of cigarette smoking cessation, and psilocybin treatment of major depression. Drug interaction studies and brain imaging studies (fMRI and PET) are examining pharmacological and neural mechanisms of action. The Hopkins laboratory has also conducted a series of internet survey studies characterizing various psychedelic experiences including those associated with acute and enduring adverse effects, mystical-type effects, entity and God-encounter experiences, and alleged positive changes in mental health, including decreases in depression and anxiety, decreases in substance abuse, and reductions in death anxiety.

Renowned researcher, policy advisor and author, Professor David Nutt, is currently Head of Neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London and the Chair of Drug Science.

Under the leadership of Professor Nutt, the Psychedelic Research Group at Imperial College is one of the world’s foremost psychedelic research laboratories, publishing landmark research on psychedelic therapies and neuroimaging studies of the psychedelic state.

Professor Nutt has also held many leadership positions in both UK and European academic, scientific and clinical organisations, including presidencies of: the European Brain Council, the British Neuroscience Association, the British Association of Psychopharmacology, the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology.

He was previously Chair of the UK Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs.

Dr William A. Richards (Bill), author of Sacred Knowledge: Psychedelics and Religious Experiences, is Director of Therapy at Sunstone Therapies in Rockville, Maryland (USA), currently focused on the implementation of psychedelic-assisted therapy in palliative care.

Bill also is a psychologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research in Baltimore, where he and his colleagues have been pursuing research with psilocybin since 1999, and teaches at the California Institute of Integral Studies and for MMA’s Certificate in Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies. Bill’s graduate degrees encompass the psychology of religion, theology, comparative religion and clinical psychology.

Bill’s involvement with psychedelic research originated in Germany at the University of Göttingen in 1963.  From 1967 to 1977, he pursued research with LSD, DPT, MDA and psilocybin at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center.