Staff/Collaborators

Vivian Garrido-Kear

PA – As Personal Assistant to Amanda Feilding, Vivian has been central to the administration of the Beckley Foundation since its inception. A qualified teacher and translator with fluency in Spanish and English, as well as with qualifications in web and graphic design, Vivian is responsible for the smooth running of the Foundation’s office, liaising with...Read More..

Rita Carter

Rita Carter is a medical writer, contributing to, among others, the Independent, New Scientist and Telegraph. She was twice awarded the Medical Journalists’ Association prize for outstanding contribution to medical journalism. She has recently joined the Beckley...Read More..

Annabel Huxley

Works as a Media Consultant for the Beckley Foundation. She has 15 years experience exclusively promoting science and science related books to the general public through festivals, symposia, conferences and PR. She helps to bring the work of the Beckley Foundation to a wider audience. Annabel has a background in...Read More..

Chewing over Khat prohibition: The globalisation of control and regulation of an ancient stimulant

TNI Series on Legislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 17 January 2012 By Axel Klein, Pien Metaal and Martin Jelsma Khat has been consumed for hundreds if not thousands of years in the highlands of Eastern Africa and Southern Arabia. Outside that area, khat use was first observed during the...Read More..

Professor Robin Room

Robin Room is a Professor of Sociology at the School of Population Health, University of Melbourne, and the director of the AER Centre for Alcohol Policy Research at Turning Point Alcohol & Drug Centre, Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia. He is also a professor at and was the founding director of the...Read More..

Martin Jelsma

Martin Jelsma is a political scientist who has specialised in Latin America and international drugs policy.  In 2005, he received the Alfred R. Lindesmith Award for Achievement in the Field of Scholarship, which stated that Jelsma “is increasingly recognized as one of, if not the, outstanding strategists in terms of how...Read More..

Professor Peter Reuter

Peter Reuter is a professor in the School of Public Affairs and in the Department of Criminology at the University of Maryland. Since July 1999, he has been the editor of the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. He was a senior economist in the Washington office of the RAND...Read More..

Peter Hakim

Mr. Hakim is president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington DC based center for policy analysis and exchange on Western Hemisphere affairs in which twelve members have served as presidents of their countries. Mr. Hakim writes and speaks widely on hemispheric issues, is regularly interviewed on radio and television, and...Read More..

Professor Wayne Hall

Wayne Hall is chief investigator and group leader of the Addiction Neuroethics Unit. He is an NHMRC Australia Fellow and Professorial Research Fellow at UQ Centre for Clinical Research, The University of Queensland. He was formerly Professor of Public Health Policy in the School of Population Health, UQ (2005-2010), Director...Read More..

Baroness Meacher

Is the Chair of the Parliamentary International Drugs Policy Reform Group. She is also the chair of the East London and City Mental Health Trust. Her Political interests include mental health, criminal justice, welfare benefits and social...Read More..

Rubem César Fernandes

One of the founders of Viva Rio, the anthropologist Rubem Cesar Fernandes is master in Philosophy at the Warsaw University (Poland) and PHD in History of the Social Thought at the Columbia University (USA). Since he came home after the political exile, in the 80s, he has been engaging himself...Read More..

Professor Benedict Fischer

Professor Benedict Fischer Faculty of Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver Benedict Fischer is Professor and CIHR/PHAC Chair in Applied Public Health at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, and the Director of Illicit Drugs, Public Health and Policy Unit at the Centre for Addictions Research of British Columbia (CAR-BC)....Read More..

Professor Simon Lenton

Simon Lenton is a Professor and Deputy Director at the National Drug Research Institute, Perth, Western Australia, and he works as a Clinical Psychologist in private practice. He has published more than 30 scientific articles, book chapters, and reports on cannabis, health and the law and presented on the topic...Read More..

Prof. David Nutt

David J. Nutt is a British psychiatrist and neuropsychopharmacologist specialising in the research of drugs which affect the brain and conditions such as addiction, anxiety and sleep. He is a professor at Imperial College London heading their Psychopharmacology Unit. He also holds the Edmond J Safra chair in Neuropsychopharmacology at...Read More..

Prof. Roland Griffiths

Roland  Griffiths, Ph.D is Professor of Behavioral Biology at Johns Hopkins University where he investigates the Behavioural Pharmacology of Drugs of Abuse. To see Prof. Griffiths full CV click here Mathew Johnson, Ph.D is assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University, where he studies behavioral pharmacology and...Read More..

Prof. Yuri Moskalenko

Prof. Yuri Moskalenko, is the Head of the Laboratory of the Sechenov Institute of Evolutionary Physiology and Biochemistry in St. Petersburg, and a world-recognized pioneer in cerebral circulation. The Beckley Foundation’s collaboration in Russia over the last five years has produced new and important findings on the dynamics of cerebral...Read More..

Prof. Torsten Passie

Torsten Passie, M.D., Ph.D. is Assistant Professor for Consciousness Studies, Hannover Medical School, Germany.  He has done extensive research over more than 20 years on the use of hallucinogenic drugs, altered states of consciousness and shamanic practices in psychotherapy and healing. He worked at the Psychiatric University Clinic in Zürich...Read More..

Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris

After completing an undergraduate degree in Psychology in 2003, Robin studied psychoanalysis at Masters level, receiving his MA in 2004. In 2005, Robin began a four year PhD in Psychopharmacology at the University of Bristol. Working for Professor David Nutt and Dr Sue Wilson, Robin’s thesis focused on sleep and...Read More..

Dr. Celia Morgan

Celia joined the UCL Ed Psych team in 2010. She holds a BSc. and Ph.D. in Psychology from University College London and a diploma in Science Communication from Birkbeck University. Her Ph.D. concerned the short and long term effects of the drug ketamine, and her research relates to the effects...Read More..

Dr. Paul Morrison

Works at the Institute of Psychiatry, London. He investigates uses  EEG the physiological effects  of the different cannabinoids (chemical components of cannabis) on the brain. His groups work so far has shown that THC produces certain neural responses which are similar to those observed in some types of mental illness....Read More..

Prof. Richard Wise

After completing his PhD at Cambridge University in cardiac imaging, Dr Wise joined the FMRIB Centre, Oxford University at the beginning of 2000. Richard worked closely with Professor Irene Tracey in her Pain Imaging Neuroscience Group. There he led the methodological development of human pharmacological FMRI studies. These examined the...Read More..

Dr. Thilo Hinterberger

Thilo  Hinterberger is with the Institute of Environmental Health at the University Hospital in Freiburg i.Br., Germany in the field of Neuroscience and consciousness research. He worked at the Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology part of the Eberhard-Karls-University of Tuebingen. Since 1997 he has worked on programming the...Read More..