On Your Mark
October 28, 2026
UW-Madison School of Pharmacy
October 29 – 30, 2026
Promega Campus, Fitchburg, WI
The 2026 UW-Madison Psychedelic Symposium is a dynamic and transdisciplinary event aimed at expanding awareness, fostering knowledge exchange, and bridging gaps in psychedelic research, education, and policy. The symposium will bring together researchers, graduate students, and key industry stakeholders to share knowledge and facilitate collaboration.
The assignment of National Priority Vouchers earlier this year to psilocybin in the treatment of depression and of methylone for treatment of PTSD adds optimism and confidence that approval by the FDA of such drugs is imminent. The theme of “On Your Mark” for this year’s UW Madison Psychedelic Symposium is chosen to reflect the race of the two front runners to gain approval of psilocybin in the near future. It is acknowledged that this race may only be the first heat of several “events” – what role will these drugs have in the treatment of afflictions such as substance use disorder, anxiety, and even vision disorders? How should these drugs and therapeutic approaches be integrated into existing mental health programs that are already challenged by inadequate access and resources?
The 2026 University of Wisconsin Psychedelic Symposium will bring together experts from across the nation and abroad to present on topics such as:
- Microdosing
- Differential pharmacology of psychedelics
- The impact of psychedelics on spirituality and religious practices
- The role of psychotherapy in psychedelic treatment
- Curated adverse event reports from psychedelic programs in Oregon and Colorado
Nationally recognized radio host Steve Paulson will again moderate multiple panel discussions.
The UW Madison Center for Psychedelic Research and Education would like to thank the Promega Biopharmaceutical Technology Center for hosting and helping support the 6th Annual UW Madison Psychedelic Symposium.
Symposium Details
Symposium Agenda
| Wednesday, October 28, 2026 | |
|---|---|
| Pre-Symposium Welcome Reception with UW students in Psychoactive Pharmaceutical Investigation | |
| 6:00 | Check-in / Introduction (UW-Madison School of Pharmacy Power Commons) Speaker: Cody Wenthur, UW-Madison School of Pharmacy |
| 6:30 | Tours and Mingling |
| Thursday, October 29, 2026 | |
| 8:15 | Check-in/Continental Breakfast |
| 8:45 | Welcome/Introductions
|
| AM Session – Palliative Care and Access | |
| 9:00 | Karen Kehl, RN, PhD (NINR) |
| 9:45 | Candace Oglesby-Adepoju, LCPC (Baltimore) |
| 10:30 | Break |
| 10:45 | Chuck Raison, MD (UW-Madison) |
| 11:15 | Panel Discussion – Moderated by: Steve Paulson
|
| 12:00 | Lunch / Professional Networking & Development Event |
| PM Session – Psychedelic Spirituality and Microdosing | |
| 1:30 | Jay Michaelson, PhD (Emory University) |
| 2:00 | Jeffrey Breau, PhD (Harvard) |
| 2:30 | Megan Miller, RN, PhD (UW-Madison) |
| 10:30 | Break |
| 3:15 | Harriet de Wit, PhD (University of Chicago) |
| 4:00 | Panel Discussion – Moderated by: Steve Paulson
|
| 4:50 | Closing Remarks – Cody Wenthur, PhD |
| 5:00 | Reception & Poster Session |
| 6:30 | Speaker Dinner |
| Friday, October 30, 2026 | |
| 8:00 | Continental Breakfast |
| 8:50 | Welcome/Introductions
|
| AM Session – Research Frontiers and Futures | |
| 9:00 | Yevgenia Kozorovitsky, PhD (Northwestern) |
| 9:30 | Charles Nichols, PhD (LSU NOLA) |
| 10:00 | Sandeep Nayak, MD (Johns Hopkins) |
| 10:30 | Break |
| 10:45 | Bev Fergus, MS |
| 11:45 | Michael Sutherland |
| 12:15 | Lunch and Poster Session |
| PM Session – Safety & Regulation | |
| 1:45 | Scott Thompson (U Colorado) |
| 2:30 | Kari Rockhill (Rocky Mountain Drug & Poison Center) |
| 3:15 | Break |
| 3:30 | Heather Barkholtz, PhD (UW-Madison) |
| 4:15 | Panel Discussion – Moderated by: Steve Paulson
|
| 4:50 | Closing Remarks – Cody Wenthur, PhD |
| 5:00 | Reception & Poster Session |
| 7:00 | Speaker Dinner |
- Heather Barkholtz, PhD
Assistant Professor, Pharmaceutical Sciences
UW-Madison School of Pharmacy - Jeffrey Breau, MDiv
Harvard Divinity School - Harriet de Wit, PhD
Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience
University of Chicago - Karen A. Kehl, PhD, RN, FPCN
Alumna, UW-Madison - Yevgenia Kozorovitsky, PhD
Associate Professor of Neurobiology
Northwestern University - Jay Michaelson, PhD, JD
Emory Center of Psychedelics and Spirituality - Megan Miller, PhD
Assistant Professor
UW-Madison School of Nursing - Sandeep Nayak, MD
Assistant Professor
Medical Director, Center for Psychedelic & Consciousness Research
- Charles Nichols, PhD
Professor of Pharmacology
LSU New Orleans - Candace Oglesby-Adepoju, LCPC, MA
Jurnee Mental Health Consulting - Charles Raison, MD
Professor of Psychiatry and Human Ecology
UW-Madison Department of Psychiatry - Kari Rockhill, PhD
Assistant Statistical Research Scientist
Rocky Mountain Poison & Drug Safety - Scott Thompson, PhD
Professor, Psychiatry-Psychopharmacology, University of Colorado
University of Colorado - Max Wolff, PhD
Psychologist, Psychotherapist, Clinician-Scientist
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Jeffrey Breau
Emory University – Center for Psychedelics and Spirituality
Jeffrey Breau is a Field Scholar with the Emory Center for Psychedelics and Spirituality, where his research focuses on psychedelic chaplaincy and the modern psychedelic church movement. He recently conducted a three-year, multisite ethnography of novel psychedelic churches in the United States. Jeffrey is an Affiliated Researcher for the Psychedelic Use, Law, and Spiritual Experience initiative at the Petrie-Flom Center at Harvard Law School, and he previously led Harvard Divinity School’s Psychedelics and Spirituality initiative. His publications span topics including a new approach to ketamine chaplaincy, the role of ritual and community in psychedelic churches, the historical foundations of the MEQ, and a landscape analysis of U.S. psychedelic facilitation training.
Karen Kehl
Alumna, UW–Madison
Karen A. Kehl is the Chief of the Systems and Models of Care Branch at the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR), National Institutes of Health (NIH) where she previously served as a Health Scientist Administrator for End-of-Life and Palliative Care Research. Dr. Kehl’s expertise spans palliative and end-of-life care, family caregiving, advance care planning, symptom management, health services research, and nursing science. Her research has focused on preparing patients and families for serious illness and death, improving hospice and palliative care delivery, and advancing evidence-based models of care.
Megan Miller
Assistant Professor, UW–Madison School of Nursing
Dr. Megan Miller’s research focuses on spirituality, symptom science, and equity in serious illness care. Drawing on a background in palliative and end-of-life nursing, she uses qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches to explore spiritual well-being, existential distress, and holistic supportive care interventions among adults with cancer. Dr. Miller was the Principal Investigator of the “PATH” study (Perceptions and Attitudes related to Psilocybin-Assisted Therapy), which qualitatively explored perspectives on psilocybin-assisted therapy among a subset of people with cancer who have been underrepresented in research. Her scholarship examines psychedelic-assisted therapy in palliative care, participant diversity in psychedelic trials, and community-engaged approaches to making psychedelic therapies more equitable and accessible.
Scott M. Thompson
Department of Psychiatry – University of Colorado School of Medicine
Scott Thompson is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. Scott’s research is focused on understanding what goes wrong in the brain in patients suffering from depression and using that knowledge to identify novel therapeutic strategies for treatment. His studies in rodents led to several novel drugs, currently in development, and novel approaches for increasing the utility and lowering the cost of using psychedelic compounds in psychiatry. In this capacity, he fosters drug development and clinical trial opportunities as Director of Novel Therapeutics for the Department of Psychiatry’s Brain and Behavior Innovation Center. He is also a co-founder of a biotech startup, ProNovo Therapeutics, developing novel drugs for treating psychiatric disease. Scott directs the Colorado Psychedelic Public Policy Partnership, providing scientific and medical advice to the State as they write the laws governing the implementation of the Natural Medicines Act, which created a legalized, regulated path for psilocybin services.
Max Wolff
Humboldt University Berlin
Max Wolff is a psychologist, psychotherapist, and clinician-scientist at Humboldt University Berlin, Germany. His research bridges psychedelic and psychotherapy research and explores psychological change processes associated with altered states of consciousness. He has contributed as a researcher and therapist to several clinical trials in the field, and is committed to advancing professional training programs such as the MIND Foundation’s Augmented Psychotherapy Training (APT), which he directed until 2025, and the OPEN Foundation’s Advanced Education in Psychedelic Therapy (ADEPT), whose self-experience curriculum he supports.