connorhaggarty.bsky.social

Postdoc w/@BrainsBeesBikes
| Cannabinoids | Psychedelics | EEG | Sociability | Anxiety | Trauma | #Cannabinerd
Hocus Pocus stan
Views my own! 🏳️‍🌈

[connorhaggarty.bsky.social @ConnorHaggarty]

Incredible week at #EBPS2025. Great location, great science, great food, and great friends. Can’t wait to do it again. Looking forward to our new leadership from Gavin McNally Keep your eyes peeled for our new communications initiatives 😉

[JAMA Psychiatry @JAMAPsych]

In individuals at clinical high risk for #psychosis, reduced temporal stability of EEG microstates was associated with earlier conversion and increased positive symptom severity. https://t.co/zFnnkHeCQT

[Olivier George @brainaddiction]

Add fentanyl to the list!
Acute semaglutide blocks cue-, drug-, and stress-induced fentanyl seeking in rats, with drug- and stress-induced reinstatement dropping to the floor at every dose, and cue-induced seeking down about 70% at the higher doses.
I've run a lot of reinstatement studies. Usually a treatment decreases only one or two of the three triggers of relapse (cue, drug, stress), and the effect sizes are modest. Hitting all three this hard is very unusual.
That strength is the headline and the caveat at the same time. When something works this cleanly on everything, you want to rule out a non-specific effect. The latency and sucrose data help, but it would be important to replicate.
If it is true, it fits a bigger idea: GLP-1 acting as a master regulator of motivation that doesn't care whether the trigger is a cue, the drug, or stress, or even the type of reward (natural, food, alcohol, nicotine, drugs, etc…). How about behavioral forms craving in gambling, OCD, tics?
@PennStHershey
https://t.co/UCiW5EfYqs

[josh hardman @Josh__Hardman]

I am looking for someone to join @Psyched_Alpha to research and write about psychedelic drug development and roll-out with me.

Do you know someone? Please let me know!

https://t.co/uZjY6qhbt4

[Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Journal @CannabisJrnl]

🔬 New method quantifies 14 cannabinoids in minutes with 99.4% accuracy — matching traditional lab testing at a fraction of the cost.

A-TEEM spectroscopy + machine learning could transform cannabis quality control.

📄 https://t.co/hFuuTyO4kr
#Cannabis #Cannabinoids #Research

[Chris Timmermann @neurodelia]

Hey everyone, lease answer this survey if you've had a psychedelic experience https://t.co/VHLt9o2ghf

[CLaE @leafs_s]

Science

Reward magnitude determines reinforcement learning efficiency

This study shows that larger rewards can dramatically accelerate learning in mice.

Across multiple behavioral tasks, bigger rewards increased task engagement and improved both within-session and across-session learning. The researchers also found that larger rewards produced stronger and longer-lasting dopamine release in the ventral striatum.

Using optogenetics, they showed that enhancing dopamine signaling could partially reproduce the learning benefits of large rewards.

Overall, the paper suggests that reinforcement learning efficiency depends strongly on reward magnitude and dopamine dynamics, not just the number of training trials.

https://t.co/1gCPgyeHeI

[Science Magazine @ScienceMagazine]

Recent studies have revealed the synchronization of neuromodulators including norepinephrine, serotonin, acetylcholine, dopamine, and histamine during sleep.

A new #ScienceReview explores what potential role the synchronization of these oscillations may play in health. https://t.co/fcDdHm1SDP

[Olivier George @brainaddiction]

GLP-1 agonists are going to be the first medications that treat polysubstance use disorder. Cocaine, meth, nicotine, alcohol, opioids. New review pulls the preclinical and emerging clinical evidence together. The preclinical peptide nerds were onto something.

@PennNursing @PennMedicine @BiolPsychiatry
https://t.co/OeZP5yyrv3

[Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Journal @CannabisJrnl]

💊 A cannabinoid that failed a clinical trial reliably suppresses nerve pain in rats — but whether it relieves spontaneous, ongoing pain remains unclear. New research highlights how preclinical pain studies can measure the wrong thing.
📄 https://t.co/4uefHDPsXR

[connorhaggarty.bsky.social @ConnorHaggarty]

@MayoOnTheBrain @pact_lab @AnaDeutsch8 @AubinKeira @CIHR_IRSC Great news, Congratulations all!

[Eur Behav Pharm Soc. @EurBehavPharm]

For those attending @FENSorg Forum this year, we have arranged a joint symposium with @EBBS_Science on Monday 6th July 10am-12pm. This symposium brings together researchers from our societies to highlight brain and behaviour from cells to systems. #FENSForum2026

[connorhaggarty.bsky.social @ConnorHaggarty]

@canna_brain Still thinking about the brick in obsession 😢

[Olivier George @brainaddiction]

Longitudinal PET study of FAAH (enzyme degrading the endocannabinoid anandamide) in cannabis users. brain FAAH binding rises ~10% within days of stopping cannabis, with the biggest jump in the ventral striatum. Increase did not correlate with THC/metabolite or CUD severity, but did with days of abstinence, depression, and impulsivity. FAAH modulators development has been a roller coaster, this reinforce the idea that it may be useful. Now there are large individual difference, which complicates interpretation. @npp_journal

[Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Journal @CannabisJrnl]

⚗️ Cannabis is legal in half the U.⚗️ Cannabis is legal in half the U.S., but every state has different safety standards for contaminants.
Consumer protection varies by zip code. Researchers call for national standards.
📄 https://t.co/YTvFlcRLDX

[Neuropsychopharmacology @npp_journal]

This recent study leverages machine learning to find that stress-related neurotoxicity may contribute to cognitive decline in PTSD / @MujicaParodi

https://t.co/Sx1GFQMBF4

[connorhaggarty.bsky.social @ConnorHaggarty]

My PI @brainsbeesbikes wrote an excellent article in @dpn_journal on her toolkit for supporting new PIs setting up their labs. https://t.co/5b1ASYFcz4. Time to absorb all that knowledge...

[Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Journal @CannabisJrnl]

🍬 Fast-acting cannabis edibles hit peak THC in 30 min vs. 60 for standard ones — same total dose, faster onset.
Could reduce accidental overdoses from impatient users, but raises new questions about impairment timing and safety labeling.
📄 https://t.co/ETwEnvX4yI

[Bertoglio lab (FMC/UFSC) @bertogliolab]

Congratulations, @RaymundiAna, @CristinaStern! So proud of this work: Sex-specific role of microglia in Δ9-THC-induced disruption of fear memory reconsolidation
https://t.co/JtmWIZ5dzZ

[PsyPost.org @PsyPost]

Whether addicted to alcohol, cocaine, or nicotine, people with substance use disorder share identical "short circuits" in their brain's reward networks. A massive new meta-analysis maps these specific neural disruptions, offering a potential blueprint… https://t.co/x6xgZpb6dA

[Bertoglio lab (FMC/UFSC) @bertogliolab]

Changes in cannabis potency and cannabis-related psychiatric harms: a 23-year ecological study in Denmark
https://t.co/Gy3DhoEs7M