Save the Date:
November 13 – 14, 2025
BioPharmaceutical Technology Center, Fitchburg, WI
The 2025 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 term “reset” can have many different meanings, depending on the context. Traditionally, it has meant a restart, often with the goal of correcting or improving a thing or action. More broadly, reset has been used to help conceptualize technology — such as restoring a device — back to its original state, while concepts like the “The Great Reset” have described large-scale economic and societal shifts. Psychedelic science and therapy have hypothesized various kinds of resets, relating to how substances and integration might help people break out of rigid thought patterns, alleviating issues like intractable depression, anxiety, or PTSD. In the realm of wellness or psychology, reset has often referred to a mental or emotional refresh and has been associated with reevaluating behavior, changing habits, or taking a break. In 2025, reset is also a useful way to think about the psychedelic field itself.
Presentations and panel discussions will focus on three priority topic areas: Industry, Safety & Regulation, Neuroscience, Neuropharmacology & Clinical.
Symposium Information
The following is a tentative agenda and there is a possibility of change. A full program will be made available in October.
Thursday, November 13 – Day 1
Theme: Safety & Regulation (Morning)
- Speakers:
- Shayla Love
- Franklin King
- Zoe Dubus
- Christine McLeave
- Panel to follow
Theme: Industry and the Future (Afternoon)
- Speakers:
- TBD
- Matt Baggott
- Jackie von Salm
- Tura Patterson
- Panel to follow
Friday, November 14 – Day 2
Theme: Industry, Neuropharmacology, Clinical (Morning)
- Speakers:
- Josh Hardman
- Ashton Barber
- Josephine Anderson
- TBD
Theme: Industry, Neuropharmacology, Clinical (Afternoon)
- Speakers:
- Katherine Nautiyal
- Chris Stauffer
- Manish Agrawal
- Cody Wenthur
- Panel to follow
Symposium dates:
Nov 13 – 14, 2025
Event Location:
BioPharmaceutical Technology Center
Promega Campus
5445 E Cheryl Pkwy
Fitchburg, WI
Registration fee
- $250 for 2 days
- $125 for one day, either Thur Nov 13 or Friday Nov 14
- Grad Students: $50 per day, either Thur Nov 13 or Fri Nov 14
Registration deadline: Nov 12, 2025
Refund Policy
Industry Perspectives
Manish Agrawal
Founder and CEO, Sunstone Therapies
Dr. Manish Agrawal’s extensive background and experience spans medicine, engineering, philosophy, ethics, and research. He currently serves as Founder & CEO of Sunstone Therapies, a leader in the delivery of psychedelic-assisted therapy in the medical setting and the development and execution of clinical trials for those affected by complex mental health challenges. Manish previously held the position of Co-Director of Clinical Research at Maryland Oncology Hematology, where he dedicated 15 years to the care of cancer patients. He completed a fellowship at the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, and his residency at Georgetown University Medical Center.
Matthew Baggott
Neuroscientist and CEO, Tactogen
Matthew Baggott is a neuroscientist and CEO of Tactogen, a public benefit corporation developing next-generation entactogens. Matthew began his scientific career in the first lab to study the potential neurotoxicity of MDMA and now has over three decades of experience studying MDMA and related molecules. Before his work at Tactogen, he was most recently a Director of Data Science and Engineering at Genentech. Matthew earned an undergraduate degree in philosophy at the University of Chicago and a doctorate in neuroscience from the University of California, Berkeley.
Josh Hardman
Founder & Editor, Psychedelic Alpha
Josh Hardman is the founder and editor of Psychedelic Alpha, an independent media and consultancy firm devoted to the psychedelics industry—from business and drug development through to policy reform and scientific research. Using data-driven reporting, analysis and commentary, Hardman strives to empower individuals with the knowledge, network and nuance to make an impact within the emerging field of psychedelic medicine and beyond. Hardman has authored hundreds of analyses on topics broadly related to psychedelic business, policy and research, such as commercialisation, IP and regulation. He has spoken about psychedelic drug development and industry at conferences worldwide and acted as an expert witness to bodies such as the European Parliament and the Dept. of Health and Human Services.
Tura Patterson
Senior Director, Strategic Partnerships, Usona Institute
Tura Patterson is the Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships at Usona Institute, where she leads an integrated portfolio that spans strategic alliances, philanthropy, educational programming, external communications, and long-term planning for the future delivery of care. With a background in economics, international relations, and sustainable development, Tura brings over 30 years of leadership experience across non-profit, academic, and high-technology sectors. At Usona, Tura’s efforts focus on cultivating partnerships and building the ecosystem to support responsible and equitable access to psychedelic therapies.
Jackie von Salm
Co-founder and CSO, Psilera, Inc
Dr. Jackie von Salm is Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Psilera, Inc., a Florida-based biotechnology company founded in 2019 focused on discovering new treatments for mental health. Dr. von Salm graduated with Honor’s (magna cum laude) with her B.A. and Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of South Florida with a focus on natural products drug discovery and chemical ecology. She was named the Most Read Author in 2017 by the American Chemical Society (ACS), awarded the Cosmic Sister Emerging Voices Award in 2019, the ACS ElSohly Award in 2020, and has been featured in National Geographic, Nature, and the Wall Street Journal.
Safety & Regulation
Zoë Dubus
Banting Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Sakskatchewan
Zoë Dubus is a post-doctoral researcher in history of medicine at Cermes3 (Université Paris Cité, CNRS, Inserm), in the ARCHE project. She obtained a funding from the Institut pour la Recherche en Santé Publique (IRESP), which seeks to document the history of clinical trials involving psychedelics in addiction treatment and psychiatric care in France and Anglo-American country. Author of numerous publications, her work aims more generally to understand the relationship between doctors and psychotropic drugs, conceived alternatively as innovative medicines or as toxic substances.
Franklin King
Clinical Instructor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. King completed residency in psychiatry at MGH/McLean followed by a fellowship in Consult-Liaison (CL) Psychiatry at MGH and a research fellowship at the MGH Cardiac Psychiatry Research Program. His areas of research include optimization of therapy paradigms within psychedelic research as well as the use of psychedelic-assisted therapies in disorders at the mind-body interface. Dr. King is currently the Principal Investigator in a pilot study exploring the feasibility of psilocybin-assisted therapy for irritable bowel syndrome, Co-PI for a collaboration with Fireside Project, a national psychedelic harm reduction organization, and is the study psychiatrist for a neuroimaging study examining the effects of MDMA-assisted therapy for fibromyalgia. He is also co-developing the Harvard-wide Interdisciplinary Program in Psychedelics with colleagues at BWH and BIDMC, a program that provides education and training in psychedelic-assisted therapies for clinicians across the HMS community.
Shayla Love
Journalist, The Atlantic
Shayla Love is a science journalist based in Brooklyn, and a contributor at The New Yorker and The Atlantic. She writes about mental health, the psychology that underpins wellness trends, and the shifting ways we understand our bodies and minds. She also covers research on psychedelics for the treatment of mental illness, and the sociocultural impacts of the psychedelic renaissance. Shayla has a master’s degree from Columbia University, and was previously a staff writer at Vice, Psyche, and The Guardian. Her work has also appeared in The New Republic, Scientific American, Harper’s Bazaar, Wired, Esquire, The New York Times, Nautilus, and more.
Neuroscience & Neuropharmacology & Clinical
Josephine Anderson
PhD Candidate, UW-Madison
Josephine Anderson is a current PhD Student at the UW Madison School of Pharmacy studying Pharmaceutical Sciences. She brings three years of analytical chemistry research experience to her current position, and has published in both the Journal of Natural Products and Molecules. Josephine’s current research is a collaboration with Boston Children’s Hospital centering around the potential effects of maternal ingestion of serotonergic hallucinogens on fetal development. Her specific focus is on the pharmacokinetics of maternal-fetal transfer of the drugs of interest, and developing methods of detection to aid said study.
Ashton Barber
PhD Candidate, UW-Madison
Ashton Barber is a 5th year PhD candidate in Ned Kalin’s lab at UW-Madison. She is passionate about understanding and developing novel treatments for mental health disorders. Her thesis work focuses on investigating the effects of ketamine and psilocybin on anxiety-related behaviors in nonhuman primates.
Kate Nautiyal
Assistant Professor – Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College
Kate Nautiyal is an Assistant Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth College. As a behavioral neuroscientist, Kate uses preclinical models to understand the mechanisms through which psilocybin changes the brain to induce persisting antidepressant effects.
Chris Stauffer
Assistant Professor – Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine, Oregon Health & Science University
Chris Stauffer, MD is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine at Oregon Health & Science University and Director of the Social Neuroscience & Psychotherapy Lab housed at the Portland VA, where he conducts clinical trials of psilocybin and MDMA-assisted therapy—with a particular interest in group therapy. He also co-founded the Open Psychedelic Evaluation Nexus, which conducts health services research on state-level legal psilocybin services.
Cody Wenthur
Associate Professor – UW–Madison School of Pharmacy
Cody Wenthur is Co-Director of the Wisconsin Opioid Overdose Response Center and
Director of Graduate Studies for the Psychoactive Pharmaceutical Investigation Programs at UW–Madison School of Pharmacy.
2025 Psychedelic Symposium – Poster Submission Overview
- Symposium registration and payment are required for participation in the poster session.
- Up to 30 posters will be accepted. To be considered your abstract must be received by Monday, September 15, 2025.
- Poster sessions will be during lunch hours and end of day receptions on both Thursday and Friday.
Submission Guidelines
- Applicants are encouraged to submit posters on research projects relevant to the Symposium theme.
- Posters focusing on hypothesis-based or hypothesis-generating research are encouraged. Posters simply proposing opinions without objective, supporting evidence are discouraged.
- Abstracts should be 200 – 300 words in length.
- Please e-mail your abstract to Pam French, who will confirm receipt and manage communications related to the Committee’s review.
- Accepted posters should be sized up to 40″ x 30″. We have foam-core boards that you can pin or clip your poster on for easel display. The orientation can be reversed; your poster can be slightly larger (or smaller) and still fit fine. We will provide pins/clips for your use.
- If you have any questions, please contact Pam French at pamela.french@wisc.edu
- Jesus Anchondo
- Liz Birkhauser
- Pam French
- Paul Hutson
- Lucas Richert
- Cody Wenthur
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