Roland Griffiths, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neurosciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and founding Director of the Johns Hopkins Center on Psychedelic and Consciousness Research. His research in both clinical and preclinical laboratories is focused on the behavioral and subjective effects of mood-altering drugs. He has conducted extensive research with sedative-hypnotics, caffeine, and novel mood-altering drugs.

In 1999 he initiated a research program investigating the effects of the classic psychedelic psilocybin that includes studies in healthy volunteers, in beginning and long-term meditators, and in religious leaders. Therapeutic studies with psilocybin include the treatment of psychological distress in cancer patients, treatment of cigarette smoking cessation, and psilocybin treatment of major depression. Other studies have examined the effects of Salvinorin A, dextromethorphan, and ketamine which produce altered states of consciousness with some similarities to psilocybin.