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Elusive LSD Fungus Finally Discovered on Flower
Science Alert ^ | June 05, 2025 | Staff

Posted on 06/05/2025 1:18:11 PM PDT by Red Badger

An elusive fungus capable of generating quantities of a compound used to synthesize the hallucinogen LSD has finally been discovered on the morning glory vine after decades of searching.

Almost a century ago, the Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman hypothesized the whimsical plant might harbor a species that belongs to a family of ergot-generating fungi.

As the man who discovered and was first to synthesize LSD ( lysergic acid diethylamide) from the ergot alkaloid, Hoffman had been keen to expand our understanding of the biology and chemistry of organisms that produced it.

While biochemical data hinted that a commonly cultivated morning glory from Mexico called Ipomoea tricolor may host just such a fungus, the symbiotic species itself has never been detected.

That is, until Corinne Hazel, an environmental microbiologist from West Virginia University, noticed a telltale layer of fuzz on the outer layer of her Ipomoea tricolor seeds.

She was investigating the way the plants transmit the evasive fungus's ergot alkaloids through their root systems.

This psychedelic byproduct of fungal symbiosis has already been detected in a quarter of the 200 morning glory species sampled from herbarium collections. Biologists had all the evidence they needed to know the fungus was there in this particular plant – except for the fungus itself.

"People have been looking for this fungus for years, and one day, I look in the right place, and there it is," Hazel says.

"We had a ton of plants lying around and they had these tiny little seed coats. We noticed a little bit of fuzz in the seed coat. That was our fungus."

series of photos showing the white fuzzy mycelium growing on a brown seed coat, then growing on a clear gel medium.

The fungus was found growing on the seed coat of morning glory plants. (Hazel & Panaccione, Mycologia, 2025)

========================================================================

After microscope and genetic analysis, Hazel and her collaborator, botanist Daniel Panaccione, concluded the fungus was new to science, and have named it Periglandula clandestina.

With biochemical analysis of the fungus suggesting it's capable of producing high amounts of the alkaloid, genetic studies might yet reveal insights into its evolution and even ways to steal its secrets for the production of pharmaceuticals.

"Morning glories contain high concentrations of similar lysergic acid derivatives that give them their psychedelic activities," Panaccione says.

"Many things are toxic. But if you administer them in the right dosage or modify them, they can be useful pharmaceuticals. By studying them, we may be able to figure out ways to bypass the side effects. These are big issues for medicine and agriculture."

The research is published in Mycologia.


TOPICS: Agriculture; Health/Medicine; History; Outdoors
KEYWORDS: ergot; godsgravesglyphs; lsd
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To: Billthedrill

So...it was you all along...
~~~~~

Ergot is neither rare nor difficult to produce. It comes naturally in souring rye and barley crops. Ergot poisoning is thought to be the cause of the Salem witch trials and a large portion of the plagues of Europe.

Villages in and after the Roman and Holy Roman empires ate from communal stores of rye and barley which soured periodically.


21 posted on 06/05/2025 2:19:47 PM PDT by nagant ( )
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To: Red Badger

The hippies knew about morning glories in the 60s.


22 posted on 06/05/2025 2:23:18 PM PDT by arthurus (covfefe coel)
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To: Red Badger

Far out man.


23 posted on 06/05/2025 2:28:41 PM PDT by showme_the_Glory (No more rhyming, and I mean it.........)
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To: Red Badger

Far out, any relation to Abby Hoffman?


24 posted on 06/05/2025 2:31:50 PM PDT by bigbob (Yes. We ARE going bac)
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To: Red Badger

Finally!


25 posted on 06/05/2025 2:51:01 PM PDT by D_Idaho ("For we wrestle not against flesh and blood...")
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To: Red Badger

People thought the rumor in the 1960s about heating banana peels on an open stove door would bring out chemicals to get high on was true. It wasn’t. 🍌

A false urban legend was that it inspired the Donovan #1 hit Mellow Yellow. But it was said by Donovan from seeing an ad for a yellow vibrator.

The Rolling Stone Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll said: “he admitted later the song made reference to a vibrator; an “electrical banana” as mentioned in the lyrics. Donovan stated, “I was reading a newspaper and on the back there was an ad for a yellow dildo called the mellow yellow,” he said.”


26 posted on 06/05/2025 2:56:33 PM PDT by frank ballenger (There's a battle outside and it's raging. It'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls. )
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To: Tom Tetroxide

Meme....

Guy is probably a mayor in a large Dem city today.

Remember the U. of Chicago retired Distinguished Professor Bill Ayres? Formerly on the 1960s-1970s most wanted list of the FBI.
“In 1969, Ayers co-founded the far-left militant organization the Weather Underground, a revolutionary group that sought to overthrow the United States government which they viewed as American imperialism. During the 1960s and 1970s, the Weather Underground conducted a campaign of bombing public buildings in opposition to U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.” Wikipedia.
Note: Due to technicalities in court including the way in which the FBI handled the case, Ayers was set free. “Illegal actions by the FBI.”

Questioned a few years ago about the bombings, he said he had “no regrets” and that “I wish we had done more.”
He absurdly tried to convince news interviewers later that he merely meant a moral feeling of opposition to the killings due to the war meant people should organized more protests in public.


27 posted on 06/05/2025 3:05:36 PM PDT by frank ballenger (There's a battle outside and it's raging. It'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls. )
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To: T.B. Yoits

I’d always heard of things in the Middle Ages. Wheat got the fungus but they had to eat it. Knew craziness would follow.

I think it was called St. Vitus dance.

I hadn’t heard of this Salem theory.


28 posted on 06/05/2025 3:38:40 PM PDT by ifinnegan (Democrats kill babies and harvest their organs to sell)
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To: Red Badger
Now, now. Just say no to drugs. If family or friends want any of my stash, I just say no.


29 posted on 06/05/2025 4:30:12 PM PDT by BipolarBob (I worked at the circus as The Human Cannonball, until they fired me.)
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To: Red Badger

Been waiting over fifty years for the flashbacks they promised!


30 posted on 06/05/2025 4:57:23 PM PDT by Species8472 (Don't celebrate sin!)
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To: frank ballenger

And the reference to being crazy ‘bout fourteen and she being crazy ‘bout him?


31 posted on 06/05/2025 5:13:16 PM PDT by null and void (Democrats: fake news, fake presidents, fake beliefs, fake policies, fake protesters & fake voters!)
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To: Red Badger

It’s shrooms now. Even heals spinal CNS injury.

The psychedelic effects are just a nuisance. That’s why I take them at night, in bed. Next day I can feel,, balance and walk much better.

I like being able to walk.

Props to the ‘Shroom


32 posted on 06/05/2025 5:15:38 PM PDT by Justa (Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people....)
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To: Justa

Another man’s account:

https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/exploration-survival/psychedelics-research-paralysis-treatment-jim-harris/


33 posted on 06/05/2025 5:37:42 PM PDT by Justa (Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people....)
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To: null and void

Impossible to answer authoritatively.

One source said it was “Fotine” (a name), another said when Donovan was age 16 the fourteenth girl he had sex with gave him hepatitis which turned his skin yellow from liver damage.

Fotina is also a cheese that is yellow and has tiny holes like Swiss.

Saffron is yellow, too. And a name (a casual girl friend of mine in 1966 had the last name, adapted from Safran.) Her father ran for mayor locally and lost.

Saffron was the daughter of British blues musician Alexis Korner; Saffron “Sappho” Gillet Korner. Friend of Donovan. I was surprised as a non drug user to hear that in the late 1960s Rorer 714s were yellow colored quaaludes.

Finally, during the banana smoking craze some stores refused to sell bananas.


34 posted on 06/05/2025 7:33:22 PM PDT by frank ballenger (There's a battle outside and it's raging. It'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls. )
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To: ifinnegan
I think it was called St. Vitus dance.

Ergot fungus would cause the craziness in Convulsive Ergotism which related to Gangrenous Ergotism, also known as "St. Anthony's Fire".

https://morbidhistory.com/ergotism-the-mystery-of-st-anthonys-fire/

(St. Vitus' dance is Sydenham's Chorea, caused by an autoimmune reaction to a childhood Strep infection).

35 posted on 06/05/2025 8:05:20 PM PDT by T.B. Yoits
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To: T.B. Yoits

Yes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_mania


36 posted on 06/05/2025 9:32:09 PM PDT by ifinnegan (Democrats kill babies and harvest their organs to sell)
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