I think I'm one of the right and lucky people in time and space to be working on Psilocybe in Australia.
Lucky in time because we're on the cusp of unlocking and harnessing the potential clinical uses of psilocybin and the stigma associated with magic mushrooms is being replaced with a public curiosity. Lucky in space because we are just starting to scratch the surface of the biodiversity of fungi in Australia and there are enormous gains in knowledge needed about whether our native mushrooms/fungi are toxic, edible or have medicinal uses. I might be the right person to work on magic mushrooms because I've studied fungal genetics and evolution for the last 15 years. I've been lucky to have training from world leaders in the United States, South Africa, Europe and Australia. The knowledge I've gained working on species of Basidiomycota will be put to good use on mushrooms, and I'm a one trick pony, so it would be wasted on any other endeavour. I can't believe it's taken me this long to move from agricultural pathogens (studying fungi as the culprit) to now studying the beneficial side of fungi. Mushrooms are one of the most nutritious, sustainable and ethical sources of food. They can be grown on recycled material and in urban areas. We need more research on mushrooms in Australia, but we do not have a critical mass of people working on fungi. A question that kept me awake at night was why psilocybin evolved to have the effect it does on humans. The genetic pathway (a cluster of five genes) is hypothesised to be >24 million years old. Every ancestor of extant mammals was alive at this point in time, but humans were a long way off. Gosh, I'd love to know where the 'magic' in magic mushrooms came from, and whether it is just luck (in time and space) that they have such a beneficial impact on our mental health 25 million years (or more) later...
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Designer Shrooms @ Funky Fungus on 1st July 2023
I started a gig at Funky Fungus as Chief Scientific Officer to make designer shrooms Our research on Psilocybe
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