Projekt

The project team examines the hidden world of mind-altering, potentially psychedelic plants, animal secretions, fungi, and insects, and their cultural, spiritual, ceremonial, ritual, and recreational uses in indigenous communities in Uganda and Tanzania. The aspect of using these natural substances for accessing altered mental states has been considered essential in practically all cultures of the world for thousands of years, thus requiring an investigation from a natural and social scientific perspective. In a similar approach, for the very first time, the uncharted territory of the use of such materials by some of our closest animal ancestors, wild mountain gorillas and chimpanzees, will be analyzed in hopes of generating pioneering scientific evidence of the intentional use of mood- and mind-changing materials in animal self-medication. The aims of the project are (1) to document the dwindling traditional knowledge for the first time, (2) to archive the chemical diversity of unexplored, rare, and almost extinct plant, insect, and fungal species for the future, (3) to identify new compounds that may lead to breakthroughs in modern medicine, (4) to report for the first time on the use of mind-altering substances by wild mountain gorillas and chimpanzees, and 5) to develop models for ethical benefit-sharing with traditional knowledge holders, which includes conducting local workshops and initiating sustainable community projects to advance best-practice ethical research practices in accordance with the Nagoya Protocol.

• Dr. Fabien Schultz

  Bernhard-Nocht-Institut
  für Tropenmedizin (BNITM)
  Sektion Implementationsforschung
  Nachwuchsforschungsgruppe Ethnopharmakologie &
  Zoopharmakognosie
  Hamburg