Psychedelic mushrooms have been used by humans for a long time, possibly forthousands of years.

The main ingredient in these mushrooms that affects our brain is called psilocybin.

Though there are many psilocybin-containing mushrooms, Psilocybe cubensis is the most common commercially grown species nowadays.

Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms.

Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms.Image: YARphotographer (Shutterstock)

Psilocybin is of course taken recreationally, if illegally in many places, for its euphoric and dissociative effects.

But in recent years, its started to receive a lot more attention for its potential health applications.

They then sequenced and compared the genetics of these varieties.

One of Funky Fungus’s new designer mushrooms, a cross-breed of an Australian variety and an existing cultivar.

One of Funky Fungus’s new designer mushrooms, a cross-breed of an Australian variety and an existing cultivar.Image: Alistair McTaggart

Their results werepublishedMonday in the journal Current Biology.

Their greater diversity today suggests that these naturalized mushrooms recovered from the lack of variation seen in commercialized cultivars.

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