Latest news with #JRT
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Scientists Tweaked LSD's Molecular Structure and Created a Wild New Brain Drug
A team of researchers at the University of California, Davis, made small tweaks to the molecular structure of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) to see if it could be turned into an effective brain-healing treatment for patients that suffer from conditions like schizophrenia — without risking a potentially disastrous acid trip. As detailed in a new paper published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences last month, the researchers created a new compound called JRT by shifting the position of just two atoms of the psychedelic's molecular structure. With the two atoms flipped, the new drug could still stimulate brain cell growth and repair damaged neural connections, while simultaneously minimizing psychedelic effects, in mice. "Basically, what we did here is a tire rotation," said corresponding author and UC Davis chemistry professor David Olson in a statement. "By just transposing two atoms in LSD, we significantly improved JRT's selectivity profile and reduced its hallucinogenic potential." In experiments involving mice, the team found that JRT improved negative symptoms of schizophrenia without worsening other behaviors associated with psychosis. While it's still far too early to tell if JRT could be effective in humans as well, the team is hoping that the new drug could become a powerful new therapeutic, especially for those suffering from conditions like schizophrenia. "No one really wants to give a hallucinogenic molecule like LSD to a patient with schizophrenia," said Olson. "The development of JRT emphasizes that we can use psychedelics like LSD as starting points to make better medicines." "We may be able to create medications that can be used in patient populations where psychedelic use is precluded," he added. Olsen and his colleagues hope their new drug could provide an alternative to drugs like clozapine, a schizophrenia treatment, without negative side effects like an inability to feel pleasure and a decline in cognitive function. Interestingly, it also proved a powerful antidepressant in early experiments involving mice at doses 100-fold lower than ketamine, a popular anesthetic used for the treatment of depression and pain management. But before it can be tested in humans, the team still has plenty of work to do. "JRT has extremely high therapeutic potential," Olsen said in the statement. Right now, we are testing it in other disease models, improving its synthesis, and creating new analogs of JRT that might be even better." More on LSD: Former CEO Sues Company That Fired Him for Microdosing LSD in an Investor Meeting
Yahoo
15-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
US scientists engineer safer LSD to treat schizophrenia and boost brain function
Since its discovery in the 1940s, LSD has fascinated the scientific world for its profound effects on perception, consciousness, and mental health. In the mid-20th century, researchers explored its potential to treat conditions like depression and addiction — until cultural backlash and safety concerns pushed it out of the medical spotlight. While interest in psychedelics has resurged in recent years, LSD remains too unpredictable for vulnerable populations, particularly those with schizophrenia. Now, scientists at the University of California, Davis, have developed a compound that could change that narrative. By flipping the position of just two atoms in LSD's structure, they've created a new molecule — called JRT — that keeps the benefits but ditches the trip. The result is a drug that enhances brain plasticity, improves cognitive function and shows promise for treating serious mental health conditions without the risks tied to traditional psychedelics. 'Basically, what we did here is a tire rotation,' said David E. Olson, director of the UC Davis Institute for Psychedelics and Neurotherapeutics. 'By just transposing two atoms in LSD, we significantly improved JRT's selectivity profile and reduced its hallucinogenic potential.' In preclinical tests, JRT displayed the ability to stimulate brain cell growth and repair damaged neural pathways — core features of successful treatment for cognitive decline and mood disorders. By avoiding the trippy side effects that limit LSD's use in clinical settings, JRT represents a new generation of psychedelic-inspired compounds tailored for safety and precision. JRT boosted key markers of neuroplasticity in mice, increasing dendritic spine and synapse density in the prefrontal cortex. The drug also showed powerful antidepressant effects, being around 100 times more potent than ketamine — the current gold standard in fast-acting antidepressants. Crucially, it didn't trigger gene expression linked to schizophrenia or produce the hallucinogenic-like behaviors commonly observed with LSD in animal models. 'No one really wants to give a hallucinogenic molecule like LSD to a patient with schizophrenia,' Olson said. 'The development of JRT emphasizes that we can use psychedelics like LSD as starting points to make better medicines. We may be able to create medications that can be used in patient populations where psychedelic use is precluded.' Named after Jeremy R. Tuck, the graduate student who first synthesized it, JRT took nearly five years to develop through a meticulous 12-step process. The UC Davis team is now testing JRT in additional disease models and refining its design. Their goal: unlock treatments that go beyond symptom management and actually rebuild the brain in conditions like schizophrenia, depression, and neurodegenerative diseases. 'JRT has extremely high therapeutic potential. Right now, we are testing it in other disease models, improving its synthesis, and creating new analogs of JRT that might be even better,' Olson said. With JRT, LSD's legacy in mental health may be coming full circle — this time, with more precision and fewer risks. The study, co-led by Tuck and fellow former grad student Lee E. Dunlap, was published April 14 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Yahoo
13-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NYC real estate agent sidelined city contract competitor as ‘direct result' of ties to top Mayor Adams aides, lawsuit says
Diana Boutross, a New York real estate broker, was able to sideline a competitor from a lucrative city government contract and secure the deal for herself as a 'direct result' of her close relationship with Ingrid Lewis-Martin and Jesse Hamilton, two longtime aides to Mayor Adams, according to an updated lawsuit. The revised lawsuit comes as Boutross, Hamilton and Lewis-Martin, who resigned as the mayor's chief adviser in December, all remain under scrutiny from the Manhattan district attorney's office. All three got their phones seized by DA investigators in September after returning from a trip to Japan, and Lewis-Martin was days after her resignation indicted on bribery and money laundering charges stemming from an alleged real estate scheme that appears unconnected to any dealings with Boutross and Hamilton. DA prosecutors said in court last week they are pursuing other 'ongoing investigations' touching on Lewis-Martin, and that other 'targets' of those probes are connected to her. The lawsuit in question was first filed last month by Boutross' competitor, JRT Realty, against her firm, Cushman & Wakefield. The suit claimed Hamilton, a top official at the city Department of Citywide Administrative Services, pressured Cushman & Wakefield to install Boutross as its main executive on a contract with Adams' administration under which she'd broker commercial property deals between private landlords and city agencies in exchange for hefty commissions. JRT, a subcontractor on the DCAS deal entitled to share in those commissions, charged in the original suit Cushman & Wakefield acquiesced to Hamilton's demand and put Boutross in the post in late 2023, at which point she took allegedly illicit steps to block JRT from deals. But an amended complaint submitted in Manhattan Supreme Court late Wednesday alleges Boutross couldn't pull off those moves alone, but relied on her connections to Lewis-Martin and Hamilton to do so. '[Boutross and her co-defendants] were able to do so only as a direct result of Boutross's personal relationships with Hamilton and Lewis-Martin,' JRT wrote in the updated complaint, which now names Boutross as well as two colleagues as defendants, in addition to Cushman & Wakefield itself, accusing them of defamation, contract breaches, tortious business intereference and other civil counts. Specifically, JRT claims Boutross had help from Lewis-Martin and Hamilton in securing 'modifications' to the city's Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises rules that allowed Boutross to more easily block JRT from sharing in commissions. The firm, which is women-owned, alleges in the suit that city administrative and contract laws were violated in the process of those modifications being made. Lewis-Martin, who has pleaded not guilty in her criminal case, isn't named as a defendant in JRT's suit, and neither is Hamilton. Attorneys and reps for Lewis-Martin, Hamilton and Boutross didn't immediately return requests for comment Thursday. In response to JRT's original suit, attorneys for Cushman & Wakefield denied wrongdoing and filed a motion asking a judge to dismiss the accusations. Also in the updated suit, JRT alleged Boutross hinted she had friends in high places when she spoke with JRT executives in mid-2023, before she was selected to take over the DCAS contract. After the JRT executives explained to her the complexities of pulling off a DCAS brokering deal, Boutross, who allegedly had no prior government leasing experience, would respond, 'Don't worry. I have a rabbi,' according to the suit. The phrase is commonly used to denote a person with high-up connections that can make a difficult situation easy. Around the same time of those talks, Hamilton had lunch with Boutross, her boss at Cushman & Wakefield and others, JRT alleges. In that lunch, Hamilton made clear to Boutross' boss that she should be tapped to oversee the contract with DCAS, according to court papers. 'She is my broker,' Hamilton said in the meeting, pointing at Boutross, JRT alleges. A spokeswoman for DCAS didn't immediately return a request for comment on the amended JRT suit. The lawsuit's playing out as Lewis-Martin's bribery case remains pending, with her lawyer and prosecutors meeting for a brief court hearing Thursday to discuss trial preparations. She has been indicted alongside her son, who allegedly received most of the bribes his mother accepted from two real estate developers in exchange for help with building permits. Unlike Adams — whose federal corruption case is in the process of being at least temporarily dismissed by President Trump's administration — Lewis-Martin was indicted by local prosecutors who have shown no sign of wanting to drop her case.
Yahoo
13-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NYC realtor sidelined city contract competitor as ‘direct result' of ties to top Mayor Adams aides: suit
Diana Boutross, a New York real estate broker, was able to sideline a competitor from a lucrative city government contract and secure the deal for herself as a 'direct result' of her close relationship with Ingrid Lewis-Martin and Jesse Hamilton, two longtime aides to Mayor Adams, according to an updated lawsuit. The revised lawsuit comes as Boutross, Hamilton and Lewis-Martin, who resigned as the mayor's chief adviser in December, all remain under scrutiny from the Manhattan district attorney's office. All three got their phones seized by DA investigators in September after returning from a trip to Japan, and Lewis-Martin was days after her resignation indicted on bribery and money laundering charges stemming from an alleged real estate scheme that appears unconnected to any dealings with Boutross and Hamilton. DA prosecutors said in court last week they are pursuing other 'ongoing investigations' touching on Lewis-Martin, and that other 'targets' of those probes are connected to her. The lawsuit in question was first filed last month by Boutross' competitor, JRT Realty, against her firm, Cushman & Wakefield. The suit claimed Hamilton, a top official at the city Department of Citywide Administrative Services, pressured Cushman & Wakefield to install Boutross as its main executive on a contract with Adams' administration under which she'd broker commercial property deals between private landlords and city agencies in exchange for hefty commissions. JRT, a subcontractor on the DCAS deal entitled to share in those commissions, charged in the original suit Cushman & Wakefield acquiesced to Hamilton's demand and put Boutross in the post in late 2023, at which point she took allegedly illicit steps to block JRT from deals. But an amended complaint submitted in Manhattan Supreme Court late Wednesday alleges Boutross couldn't pull off those moves alone, but relied on her connections to Lewis-Martin and Hamilton to do so. '[Boutross and her co-defendants] were able to do so only as a direct result of Boutross's personal relationships with Hamilton and Lewis-Martin,' JRT wrote in the updated complaint, which now names Boutross as well as two colleagues as defendants, in addition to Cushman & Wakefield itself, accusing them of defamation, contract breaches, tortious business intereference and other civil counts. Specifically, JRT claims Boutross had help from Lewis-Martin and Hamilton in securing 'modifications' to the city's Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises rules that allowed Boutross to more easily block JRT from sharing in commissions. The firm, which is women-owned, alleges in the suit that city administrative and contract laws were violated in the process of those modifications being made. Lewis-Martin, who has pleaded not guilty in her criminal case, isn't named as a defendant in JRT's suit, and neither is Hamilton. Attorneys and reps for Lewis-Martin, Hamilton and Boutross didn't immediately return requests for comment Thursday. In response to JRT's original suit, attorneys for Cushman & Wakefield denied wrongdoing and filed a motion asking a judge to dismiss the accusations. Also in the updated suit, JRT alleged Boutross hinted she had friends in high places when she spoke with JRT executives in mid-2023, before she was selected to take over the DCAS contract. After the JRT executives explained to her the complexities of pulling off a DCAS brokering deal, Boutross, who allegedly had no prior government leasing experience, would respond, 'Don't worry. I have a rabbi,' according to the suit. The phrase is commonly used to denote a person with high-up connections that can make a difficult situation easy. Around the same time of those talks, Hamilton had lunch with Boutross, her boss at Cushman & Wakefield and others, JRT alleges. In that lunch, Hamilton made clear to Boutross' boss that she should be tapped to oversee the contract with DCAS, according to court papers. 'She is my broker,' Hamilton said in the meeting, pointing at Boutross, JRT alleges. A spokeswoman for DCAS didn't immediately return a request for comment on the amended JRT suit. The lawsuit's playing out as Lewis-Martin's bribery case remains pending, with her lawyer and prosecutors meeting for a brief court hearing Thursday to discuss trial preparations. She has been indicted alongside her son, who allegedly received most of the bribes his mother accepted from two real estate developers in exchange for help with building permits. Unlike Adams — whose federal corruption case is in the process of being at least temporarily dismissed by President Trump's administration — Lewis-Martin was indicted by local prosecutors who have shown no sign of wanting to drop her case.
