Charles D. Nichols

Charles D. Nichols is an American pharmacologist who studies psychedelic drugs and inflammation. He also studied fruit flies for many years, including giving them psychedelics. He is also the co-editor-in-chief of the academic journal Psychedelic Medicine, which started in 2022.

Nichols discovered that psychedelics such as DOI show powerful anti-inflammatory effects and that this effect is mediated by functionally selective activation of serotonin 5-HT2A receptors. Moreover, he found that the anti-inflammatory effects of psychedelics are dissociable from their hallucinogenic effects. The anti-inflammatory effects of psychedelics are of interest in the potential treatment of inflammatory diseases, such as asthma and neuroinflammation. Nichols has studied psychedelic microdosing in humans towards potential anti-inflammatory benefits.

Nichols received his bachelor's degree in biology and biochemistry from Purdue University in 1989, his Doctor of Philosophy at Carnegie Mellon University in 1997, and completed his postdoc in pharmacology at Vanderbilt University in 2002, before moving to Louisiana State University.

Selected publications