Tusi (a mixture of ketamine and other drugs) is on the rise among NYC nightclub attendees

Society for the Study of Addiction

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“Tusi”, also known as “tucibí” or “pink cocaine”, is a drug concoction that emerged in Latin America and Europe within the past decade and is becoming increasingly popular in the USA.  A new study published in the scientific journal Addiction estimates that in 2024, 2.7% of electronic dance music-nightclub attending adults in New York City (NYC) used Tusi in the past year, with higher use among Hispanic people and people who use other drugs.  

Consumers often don’t understand what Tusi is when they take it.  Tusi is commonly confused with the 2C family of drugs – psychedelics – because it is a phonetic translation of “2C”. Tusi is also commonly called “tucibí” or “tusibí” (the phonetic translation of 2C-B, a particular type of psychedelic).  And it is also often called “pink cocaine” (“cocaina rosada” in Spanish).  All of these names have the potential to confuse people who use, who may believe they are taking a psychedelic drug or largely unadulterated cocaine. 

In fact, Tusi is a drug mixture that rarely contains 2C drugs and most commonly contains ketamine and MDMA (ecstasy), sometimes in combination with cocaine.  And therein lies the potential danger.

Lead author Dr Joseph Palamar, of NYU Grossman School of Medicine, explains: “People who use illicit drugs are often at risk of using drugs adulterated or even replaced by other drugs.  But Tusi puts people who use drugs at an even higher risk, partly because it is easily confused with two other types of drugs – 2C series or cocaine – and partly because Tusi is pretty much always a concoction of various drugs. This greatly increases the risk of adverse or unexpected effects.”

Tusi use in this study was determined by self-report.  The study surveyed a sample of 1,465 adults attending 124 electronic dance music events hosted by NYC nightclubs from January through November 2024.  Participants took a survey on an electronic tablet before entering the nightclub. The survey results were used to estimate prevalence of Tusi use among all people who attended an electronic dance music event at a NYC nightclub in 2024.

Ketamine/MDMA drug mixtures marketed as “tucibí” or “pink cocaine” have been reported from Spain since about 2018.  In Latin America, drug checking programs in Argentina have been testing the contents of Tusi since at least 2019, in Uruguay since at least 2020, and in Columbia and Chile since at least 2021.  Systematic drug checking data focusing on Tusi have been lacking in the US.

-- Ends –

For editors:

This paper is available to read online on the Wiley Online Library for one month after the embargo has lifted (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/add.70069) or you may request an early copy from Jean O’Reilly, Editorial Manager, Addiction, jean@addictionjournal.org.

To speak with lead author Dr Joseph Palamar, please contact him at the New York University Grossman School of Medicine by email (joseph.palamar@nyulangone.org).

Full citation for article: Palamar JJ, Abukahok N, Acosta P, Krotulski AJ, Walton SE, Stang B, and Cleland CM.  Tusi Use among the New York City Nightclub-Attending Population. Addiction. 2025. DOI: 10.1111/add.70069

Primary funding:  National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) award numbers R01DA057289, R01DA060207, and P30DA01104.

Declaration of interests: Dr. Palamar has consulted for the Washington-Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program. The authors have no potential conflicts to declare.

Addiction (www.addictionjournal.org) is a monthly international scientific journal publishing peer-reviewed research reports on alcohol, substances, tobacco, gambling, editorials, and other debate pieces. Owned by the Society for the Study of Addiction, it has been in continuous publication since 1884.

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Journal

Addiction

DOI

10.1111/add.70069 

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Tusi Use among the New York City Nightclub-Attending Population

Article Publication Date

21-Apr-2025

COI Statement

Dr. Palamar has consulted for the Washington-Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program. The authors have no potential conflicts to declare.

 

The puberty talk: Parents split on right age to talk about body changes with kids

Common challenges: when to start talking about puberty and whether to explain sex to kids, national poll suggests

Michigan Medicine - University of Michigan

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Parents polled shared a range of approaches and worries in preparing their tweens for this major stage of development.
 

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Credit: Sara Schultz, University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. –  Most parents agree that talking to their kids about puberty is important—but when and how to start the conversation is often less clear, a new national poll suggests.

Among the most common challenges for parents: choosing the right age to start talking about body changes and whether to explain sex, according to the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health.

Parents are evenly split in thinking it’s best to start talking about puberty before 10 years, at age 10 or when children are older.

“It’s easy to assume a child is too young for conversations about puberty, but many parents are surprised to find their tween already showing signs of puberty or asking unexpected questions about body changes,” said Mott Poll Co-Director Sarah Clark, M.P.H.

“Starting the conversation early gives parents a chance to shape the message in an age-appropriate way and help kids know what to expect, so they’re not confused or anxious. If parents don’t open the door to these talks, kids may get their information elsewhere, like from classmates, social media, or what they see on TV.”

Parents polled shared a range of approaches, worries, and gaps in preparing their tweens for this major stage of development.

About half of parents describe their approach to talking with their child about puberty as proactive while two in five say they talk about it only when asked. Another 5% avoid the conversation altogether.

One in five parents also worried about feeling embarrassed while one in six feared saying the wrong thing when it came to the subject. Among parents of children 10-12 years, a quarter say their child doesn’t want to talk about puberty, and among parents of children 7-9 years, nearly a third believe their child is too young to understand.

Some of the hesitancy about broaching this subject may stem from parents’ own experiences, Clark notes.

While nearly half of parents have talked about their own puberty experiences with their kids, less than a third say they received adequate puberty teaching from their own parents. More than a third say their parents did not teach them about puberty at all.

“Whether they realize it or not parents may bring their own experiences into their parenting approach,” Clark said. “Many parents said they had little or no discussion of puberty when they were young. If puberty was treated as an awkward or embarrassing subject growing up, that can make it harder to know how to begin.”

Another common challenge shared by parents was whether, when, and how much to talk about sex and reproduction.

“Early conversations should focus on making kids aware that they will experience physical and emotional changes, and reassuring them that those changes are normal. Discussions about sex can occur over time,” Clark said.

Parents can also look for resources on how to talk with kids, such as parenting books, Clark recommends. Annual check-ups may also be a good opportunity for both parents and children to learn about puberty-related changes and ask the doctor questions.

Parents may also want to learn about health education offered through their child’s school and build on that information.

Recognizing puberty signs

About half of parents are very confident they can recognize signs of puberty in their child, with 60% of parents of children 10-12 years and 17% of parents of children 7-9 years noticing puberty signs. Less than a third of parents weren’t sure what changes to look for.

Many parents also report that their child has asked about their own body, their parent’s body or other puberty-related topics.

It’s important, Clark says, for parents to look out for teachable moments, like when a child brings up a question, and use them as opportunities to start or continue the conversation.

Ongoing, supportive discussions are also key as children grow and encounter new phases of puberty, she adds.

“Puberty isn’t just about physical changes — it’s also a time of emotional disruption, which can make open communication challenging,” Clark said. “Many tweens feel embarrassed or uncomfortable talking with their parents about these changes.”

“To help ease the discomfort, some parents may give their child an age-appropriate book or video about puberty and allow the child to explore the topic privately. Often, that leads to additional discussion with parents.”

ATTN: RFK JR

Study reveals new genetic mechanism behind autism development

The Hospital for Sick Children

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Scientists from The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) and University of Las Vegas Nevada (UNLV) have uncovered a genetic link between autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and a rare genetic condition called myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1). The study, published today in Nature Neuroscience, suggests that while ASD has previously been characterized by a loss of gene function, another mechanism may be leading to the social behaviours often observed in individuals with ASD. 

DM1 is an inherited condition which causes progressive muscle loss and weakness. While ASD is present in around one per cent of the general population, it is 14 times more likely to develop in people with DM1.  

The study revealed that the genetic variation that causes DM1 — tandem repeat expansions (TREs) in the DMPK gene — also impacts brain development. The research team found that the effects of TREs interfere with a critical process called gene splicing, which is essential for gene function. The disruption causes a protein imbalance that can result in mis-splicing of multiple genes involved in brain function, and may explain why some of the social and behavioural outcomes of ASD develop in people with DM1. 

“Our findings represent a new way to characterize the genetic development of autism,” explains Dr. Ryan Yuen, Senior Scientist in the Genetics & Genome Biology program at SickKids. “By identifying the molecular pathway behind this connection, we can begin to investigate new approaches to ASD diagnosis and the development of precision therapies that release these proteins back into the genome.” 

What are TREs? 

TREs occur when sections of a DNA strand are repeated two or more times, and the likelihood of those repeats causing errors in gene function increases each time.  

In 2020 Yuen discovered that TREs are genetic contributors to autism, identifying more than 2,588 different places in the genome where TREs were much more prevalent in people with ASD. Similarly, people with DM1 have a TRE in the DMPK gene. 

“A variation really stood out to me that we see in rare neuromuscular disease,” says Dr. Łukasz Sznajder, a research lead and Assistant Professor at UNLV. “This is how we started connecting the dots. We found a molecular link, or overlap, which we believe is the core of causing autistic symptoms in children with myotonic dystrophy.” 

Gene splicing a key contributor to the development of ASD 

As the tandem repeat expands in the DMPK gene, the research team, including collaborators at the University of Florida and Adam Mickiewicz University (Poland), found its altered RNA binds to a protein that is involved in gene splicing regulation during brain development. This so-called “toxic RNA” depletes the protein and prevents it from binding to other RNA molecules in important areas of the genome, causing a protein imbalance which results in mis-splicing other genes. 

“TREs are like a sponge that absorbs all these important proteins from the genome. Without this protein, other areas of the genome don’t function properly,” explains Yuen.  

The Yuen Lab and Sznajder Lab are already exploring whether this mis-splicing is happening in other genes associated with ASD, as well as how their findings could inform precision therapies that release these proteins back into the genome.  

Some of this work is already underway. In 2020, Dr. Christopher Pearson, Senior Scientist in the Genetics & Genome Biology program at SickKids, identified a molecule that can contract TREs in Huntington’s disease. While more research is needed to identify how this could be applied to other conditions, the team remains optimistic their findings could inform future research and care for DM1, ASD and other conditions. 

This study was funded by the Azrieli Foundation, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Myotonic Dystrophy Foundation, Muscular Dystrophy Association, the UNVL startup fund, the University of Florida Centre for Autism and Neurodevelopment, the National Science Centre, Poland, SickKids Research Institute, Brain Canada, the Government of Ontario, the University of Toronto McLaughlin Centre, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), The Petroff Family Foundation, Tribute Communities, The Marigold Foundation and SickKids Foundation. 

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Journal

Nature Neuroscience

DOI

10.1038/s41593-025-01943- 

Article Title

Autism-related traits in myotonic dystrophy type 1 model mice are due to MBNL sequestration and RNA mis-splicing of autism-risk genes

Article Publication Date

21-Apr-2025

 

Omnivorous? Vegan? Makes no difference to muscle building after weight training, study finds

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, News Bureau

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Graphic by Michael B. Vincent

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Credit: Graphic by Michael B. Vincent

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — A new study asked three questions about muscle protein synthesis in response to a nine-day diet and weight training regimen: First, does the source of protein — plant or animal-based — make any difference to muscle gain? Second, does it matter if total daily protein intake is evenly distributed throughout the day? And third, does a moderate but sufficient daily protein intake influence any of these variables? The answer to all three questions is “no,” the researchers found.

Their findings are reported in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise.

“The longstanding belief or the current dogma was that animal-based protein sources were better, particularly for the muscle-building response,”  said Nicholas Burd, a professor of health and kinesiology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who led the new study with former graduate student Andrew Askow. This belief was rooted in science: Previous studies that took muscle biopsies after a single feeding found that an animal-based meal provided more of a stimulus for muscle protein synthesis than a vegan meal, Burd said. “And so, our general hypothesis based on these previous studies was that the animal-based eating pattern would be more effective at supporting the muscle-building response.”

But measurements taken after a single meal might not reflect the effects of consuming a balanced vegan diet over time, Burd said.

One previous clinical trial had looked at muscle responses in vegans and omnivores who ate a laboratory diet and engaged in weight training for 10 weeks. That study found no significant differences in muscle protein synthesis over time. However, volunteers in that study consumed 1.6-1.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day, which is much higher than what is needed to maximize muscle protein synthesis and build bigger muscles with weight lifting, Burd said. It also gave those on the vegan diet the bulk of their plant protein in supplements, which is not a realistic recreation of how vegans normally eat, he said.

Burd and his colleagues wanted to know whether the habitual consumption of a varied vegan or meat-based diet of whole foods — rather than ingestion of just a single meal or getting one’s protein from limited sources — would influence the rate of muscle protein synthesis over time. They also wanted to test the hypothesis that a moderate protein intake — in the range of 1.1-1.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day — should be distributed evenly throughout the day to maximize muscle growth.

A previous study from Burd’s lab found that protein intakes higher than 1.1 g/kg per day make no difference to the rate of muscle protein synthesis when weight training. This amount of protein also is more in line with a typical American diet, and testing what people normally eat is important, he said.

For the new study, the team recruited 40 healthy, physically active 20-40-year-old adults. The participants underwent a seven-day “habituation diet” to standardize their nutritional status prior to the clinical trial. Then they were randomly assigned to either a vegan or omnivorous diet. The research team provided all meals, some of which were eaten in the lab while most were consumed at home. Roughly 70% of the protein for the omnivorous meals was obtained from animal sources: beef, pork, chicken, dairy, eggs. The vegan diet balanced the amino acid content of the meals, ensuring that participants consumed complete proteins.  

The vegan and omnivorous groups were each divided again into those who ate roughly the same amount of protein at each of three meals and those whose protein intake varied across five meals throughout the day, with a larger proportion of protein consumed toward the end of the day.

All participants engaged in a series of muscle-strengthening activities in the lab every three days. They also wore accelerometers to keep track of their activity levels when not in the lab.

Each day, participants drank “heavy” water, which was labeled with deuterium, a stable isotope of hydrogen. The deuterium atoms “exchanged with hydrogen atoms within amino acids to make them heavy and served as tracers” that allowed the team to trace their incorporation into muscle tissue, Burd said. Biopsies of tissue from a leg muscle were taken at the beginning and end of the trial.

Burd was initially surprised to see that there were no differences in rates of muscle protein synthesis between those eating vegan or omnivorous diets. He also was surprised to see that protein distribution across the day had no effect on the rate of muscle building given results from past studies of acute responses to dietary interventions and weight training.

“It was thought that it was better to get a steady-state delivery of nutrients throughout the day,” he said. “I also thought that if you’re getting a lower quality protein — in terms of its digestibility and amino acid content — that perhaps distribution would make a difference. And surprisingly, we showed it doesn’t matter.”

Now, Burd says, if anyone asks him what’s the best type of food they should eat for muscle building, he’ll tell them: “It’s the kind you put in your mouth after exercise. As long as you’re getting sufficient high-quality protein from your food, then it really doesn’t make a difference.”

The Beef Checkoff program, overseen by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Board, supported this research.

 

Editor’s note:  

To reach Nicholas Burd, email naburd@illinois.edu.  

The paper “Impact of vegan diets on resistance exercise-mediated myofibrillar protein synthesis in healthy young males and females: A randomized controlled trial” is available online.

DOI: 10.1249/MSS.0000000000003725

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Journal

Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise

DOI

10.1249/MSS.0000000000003725 

Method of Research

Randomized controlled/clinical trial

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Impact of vegan diets on resistance exercise-mediated myofibrillar protein synthesis in healthy young males and females: A randomized controlled trial

Article Publication Date

4-Apr-2025

COI Statement

Beef Checkoff sponsor was only involved in financial support of the project, without involvement in design, data collection, and analysis, nor interpretation and dissemination of the report.

 

Protecting audio privacy at the source

Developed by Carnegie Mellon, Kirigami provides on-device speech filtering for audio sensing

Carnegie Mellon University

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Sound is a powerful source of information.

By training algorithms to identify distinct sound signatures, sound can reveal what a person is doing, whether it's cooking, vacuuming or washing the dishes. And while it's valuable in some contexts, using sound to identify activities comes with privacy concerns, since microphones can reveal sensitive information.

To allow audio sensing without compromising privacy, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University developed an on-device filter, called Kirigami, that can detect and delete human speech segments collected by audio sensors before they're used for activity recognition.

"The data contained in sound can help power valuable applications like activity recognition, health monitoring and even environmental sensing. That data, however, can also be used to invade people's privacy," said Sudershan Boovaraghavan, who earned his Ph.D. from the Software and Societal Systems Department (S3D) in CMU's School of Computer Science. "Kirigami can be installed on a variety of sensors with a microphone deployed in the field to filter speech before the data is sent off the sensor, thus protecting people's privacy."

Many existing techniques for preserving privacy in audio sensing involve altering or transforming the data — excluding certain frequencies from the audio spectrum or training the computer to ignore human speech. While these methods are fairly effective at making conversations indecipherable to humans, generative AI has complicated matters. Speech recognition programs like Whisper by OpenAI can piece together fragments of conversations from processed audio that were once inscrutable.

"Given the sheer amount of data these models have, some of the prior techniques would leave enough residual information, little snippets, that may help recover part of speech content," said Yuvraj Agarwal, an associate professor in S3D, the Human-Computer Interaction Institute (HCII), and the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department in the College of Engineering. "Kirigami can stop these models from having access to those snippets."

In today's world, devices like smart speakers that prioritize utility over privacy can essentially eavesdrop on everything people say. While the most aggressive privacy-preserving option would be to avoid using microphones, such an action would stop people from reaping the benefits of a powerful sensing medium. Agarwal and his collaborators wanted to find a solution for developers that would allow them to balance privacy and utility.

The researchers' intuition was to design a lightweight filter that could run on even the smallest, most affordable microcontrollers. That filter could then identify and remove likely speech content so the sensitive data never leaves the device — what's often called processing on the edge. 

The filter works as a simple binary classifier of whether there's speech in the audio. The team designed the filter by empirically analyzing the leaked speech content recognition rate from deep-learning-based automatic speech recognition models.

Kirigami also balances how aggressively it removes possible speech content with a configurable threshold. With an aggressive threshold, the filter prioritizes removing speech but may also clip some nonspeech audio that could be useful for other applications. With a less aggressive threshold, the filter allows more environmental and activity sounds to pass for better application values but increases the risk of some speech-related content making it beyond the sensor.

"Kirigami cuts out most of the speech content but not the other ambient sounds that you care about for activity recognition," said Haozhe Zhou, an S3D doctoral student who led the project with Boovaraghavan. "You can still couple it with prior techniques to give you additional privacy."

Researchers are currently exploring many useful applications for activity sensing. For example, Mayank Goel, an associate professor in S3D and the HCII, uses audio sensing to remind people living with dementia of daily tasks, monitor children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder for behavioral abnormalities, and assess students for signs of depression.

"These are just examples that are being done in our labs," Goel said. "You will find similar scenarios all across the world where you need noninvasive data from the person about their daily life."

As the interest in smart home infrastructure and the Internet-of-Things continues to grow, the team believes that developers could easily tweak Kirigami to suit their unique privacy needs.

Papers detailing Kirigami appeared in both the Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies and ACM MobiCom '24: Proceedings of the 30th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking.