Groundbreaking Study Shows Your Brain (Though Perhaps Not Your Ego) on LSD

You may or may not know what it feels like for your ego “to dissolve” under the effects of LSD, but now—with a brain-imaging study described as a historic breakthrough—you can at least know what it looks like.

“In many ways, the brain in the LSD state resembles the state our brains were in when we were infants: free and unconstrained. This also makes sense when we consider the hyper-emotional and imaginative nature of an infant’s mind.” —Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris, lead researcher

In a study published on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Imperial College London, in partnership with the Beckley Foundation, have for the first time visualized the effects of lysergic acid diethylamide, commonly called LSD, on the brain of users.

The study, according to a statement by the researchers, 

As the Guardian described the phenomenon, “trippers experienced images through information drawn from many parts of their brains, and not just the visual cortex at the back of the head that normally processes visual information. Under the drug, regions once segregated spoke to one another.”

Amanda Feilding, Director of the Beckley Foundation, said: “We are finally unveiling the brain mechanisms underlying the potential of LSD, not only to heal, but also to deepen our understanding of consciousness itself.”

Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris, from the Department of Medicine at Imperial, who led the team, explained their findings this way: