inquiry + innovation
Research Shortens Time to Treatment By Carole Johnson
Researchers at Miami University have been awarded two grants totaling $2.5 million from PsyBio Therapeutics Corp. to expedite progress toward clinical trials of a portfolio of neuropsychiatric drugs focused on mental health issues.
Research conducted by Assistant Professor J. Andrew Jones and students in his lab has piqued the interest of researchers at PsyBio, which is in the business of pioneering the next generation of psychoactive compounds for mental health treatment.
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miamian magazine
Last year, PsyBio and Miami joined forces to develop and test a new class of molecules to treat mental health challenges such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, and substance dependency. In May 2020, the company awarded an initial $1 million grant to J. Andrew Jones in Miami’s department of chemical, paper, and biomedical engineering, and Matthew McMurray in Miami’s department of psychology. The original grant served as startup funding to further expand on technology developed by Jones and a team of students in 2019 that enables the biosynthesis of psilocybin and other psychoactive molecules that occur naturally in certain plants and fungi. Through metabolic engineering, Jones and his student assistants discovered a rapid way to produce psilocybin, a psychedelic drug found in mushrooms that shows great promise for treating depression and addiction. Currently, mass producing psilocybin requires extensive real estate and time. Alternative synthetic chemical production methods are expensive. Determined to find a solution that maintains biological integrity and reduces production costs, Jones and his team developed a series of experiments to identify optimal psilocybin production conditions. Their work involved taking DNA from the mushroom and putting it in E. coli. Their result was a significant step toward demonstrating the feasibility of producing the drug economically from a biological source.
As Jones explains it, “It’s similar to the way you make beer, through a fermentation process. We are effectively taking the technology that allows for scale and speed of production and applying it to our psilocybin-producing E. coli.”
Rewiring the brain
Their work piqued the interest of researchers at PsyBio, which is in the business of pioneering the next generation of psychoactive compounds for mental health treatment. The compounds, called tryptamines, are being studied to reverse the course of disease by rewiring the brain through contemplation and a change of perception. Many tryptamines are also known for their hallucinogenic properties and have been receiving international recognition for their therapeutic potential. These compounds act on and increase the synaptic and neurotransmitter activity in the brain that is responsible for stimulating the reward system. Through novel application of pathway optimization techniques and metabolic engineering principles, Jones and his team discovered a way to sustainably produce
