Usona Institute
The Usona Institute is a 501 non-profit medical research organization which is developing psychedelic drugs for potential medical use. It was launched by scientist and entrepreneur Bill Linton, who is the founder of the biotechnology company Promega Corporation, and by physician Malynn Utzinger in 2014.
The organization is developing psilocybin for treatment of depression. It started a phase 2 clinical trial of psilocybin for major depressive disorder in 2019. The same year, this candidate received Food and Drug Administration "breakthrough therapy" designation. This clinical trial has since been completed and its psilocybin candidate is now in phase 3 clinical studies. In July 2024, it was said that the Usona Institute was leading the largest clinical trial of ongoing psilocybin treatment for depression, a phase 3 trial with 240participants treated with 5 or 25mg psilocybin or placebo. Other candidates of the institute include mebufotenin and bufotenin, among others.
The Usona Institute is notable in manufacturing large quantities of synthetic psilocybin and supplying the drug for clinical trials throughout the world, which it does for free for research purposes.