What we do
We're developing safe, FDA, EMA and Health Canada approved therapies for neuropsychiatric conditions, starting with sub-perceptual psilocybin-based medicines that have the potential to deliver greater impact than current first-line treatments.
Our programs
Diamond’s approach holds the promise of surpassing current first line treatments— which have seen no significant breakthrough for the last 30 years—in efficacy, speed of onset, safety and tolerability. Our first clinical program is focused on accessible psilocybin-based drugs that deliver rapid therapeutic outcomes without perceptual side effects. By eliminating the side effects, this intervention can be administered to a broad cohort of patients.
We are also advancing a diverse pipeline of tryptamine analogs and small organic molecules that act by modulating selective serotonin receptors and neurotrophic receptor signalling.
Our team
One of Canada's top health science executives, Ms. Blumstock has over 25 years of venture capital and private equity experience, spanning early to late-stage investments in life sciences and biotechnology. She has spent more than ten years as the executive director of corporate development at Toronto Innovation Acceleration Partners (TIAP), formerly known as MaRS Innovation. TIAP specializes in venture building for early-stage health science technologies and takes leading-edge research from discovery to market. Before this, Ms. Blumstock was a principal with Genesys Capital, one of the largest Canadian-based venture-capital firms focused exclusively on the life sciences industry. She was a partner with RBC Capital Partners life sciences fund. Ms. Blumstock was also the director of biological and pharmaceutical research at Drug Royalty Corporation (now DRI Capital Inc.), which provides financial solutions in exchange for royalties to health-related organizations worldwide. She is an advisor to the preclinical biotechnology company Bright Angel Therapeutics, and to Bitnobi, a privacy protected data sharing platform. Ms. Blumstock has an MBA in finance from Columbia Business School in New York. Her BSc in biology is from the University of Toronto.
Mr. Hilson brings over two decades of operational and capital markets experience in the pharmaceutical and health care sectors. He was the founding chief financial officer and subsequently chief commercial officer of Cronos Group Inc. (CRON: NASDAQ), the first cannabis company to list on a major U.S. securities exchange. Founded in 2016, Cronos closed a C$2.4 billion strategic investment from Altria Group in 2019. Before this, Mr. Hilson spent over 15 years in executive roles with multinational pharmaceutical companies. As the CFO of Serono Canada Inc. and later the CFO of EMD Inc. (div. of Merck KGaA), his responsibilities included financial operations, strategy, performance management, capital markets, international tax, debt, and equity financing. Mr. Hilson was also involved in many M&A and licensing deals in the pharmaceutical industry. He is a certified public accountant (CPA) and holds an audit chair certificate from McMaster University. He has an MSc in clinical biochemistry from the University of Toronto and an Honors BSc in genetics from the University of Western Ontario. Mr. Hilson completed his clinical research in neuroscience at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.
Dr. McDonnell specializes in emergency medicine and abuse liability. He has over 20 years of experience as a practitioner, lecturer, professor and principal investigator and has worked with institutions including Worldwide Clinical Trials, Syneos Health, Inc Research and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.
An entrepreneurial executive with more than 20 years of experience in corporate and securities law, capital markets and investment management. Grant has served in director and CEO roles with both public and private companies and investment funds. He is the founding partner of Cuspis Capital, a company that enables and supports going public transactions via Capital Pool Corporations.
Dr. Brown is a seasoned leader with 25 years of pharmaceutical product development experience for the US, EU and Canadian markets. He has an impressive track record of experience, having held senior positions at leading pharmaceutical companies, including Teva Canada, Impopharma and Patheon. He has developed numerous dosage forms, including complex and high barrier-to-entry drug-device combination products, for multiple global markets. His broad expertise includes program management; he has successfully taken projects from pipeline selection and project concept through to commercialization. Dr. Brown completed his PhD in pharmaceutics at the School of Pharmacy, University of London.
Dr. Sprouse has spent 20+ years leading successful preclinical drug development efforts for top-tier pharmaceutical organizations. In his 15 years with Pfizer’s neuroscience department, Dr. Sprouse led a number of drug discovery efforts which culminated in the nomination of two clinical candidates in the mood disorders space. At Lundbeck Research USA, he led a psychiatry-based disease focus team responsible for replenishing Lundbeck’s exploratory portfolio of discovery projects. Separately, he joined the efforts of their business development teams in evaluating licensing opportunities. Dr. Sprouse earned his doctorate in pharmacology at the Joan & Sanford I. Weill Medical College of Cornell University where his research focused on drug-induced changes in the excitability of spinal motor neurons. Just prior to entering industry he completed a postdoctoral fellowship in neuropharmacology at the Yale University School of Medicine under the mentorship of George Aghajanian. There he undertook the functional study of serotonergic neurons of the dorsal raphe focusing on receptor mechanisms. Dr. Sprouse is the author of more than 50 publications. He is listed as an inventor on five US-issued patents.
Dr. Raimondi is a registered patent agent with 20 years of experience in intellectual property management for the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sectors. She has held senior positions at Crescita Therapeutics Inc. and Nuvo Pharmaceuticals Inc. (now Miravo Healthcare). Prior to moving in-house, Dr. Raimondi was a patent agent at one of Toronto’s leading law firms where she advised clients on patents, licensing, and litigation matters.
A healthcare innovator, integrative health coach and global community builder, Dr. Mehta spearheads Diamond's digital health and partnership programs. She brings over ten years of experience working in research commercialization, health data privacy and scientific wellness to her role. Dr. Mehta holds a PhD in molecular toxicology from the University of Toronto and a bachelor's degree in biomedical sciences from the University of Waterloo. She has authored over 15 scientific publications. Dr. Mehta is an industry advisory board member for McGill University's Masters in Management Analytics program. She also serves as an ambassador to Sandbox, a global community of passionate trailblazers and pioneers who seek to impact the world positively and inspire others to do the same. Dr. Mehta practices and teaches ancient breathwork and kriya-kundalini yoga from the Himalayan Vedantic tradition.
Jamie Jarecki-Smith brings more than 15 years of clinical experience spanning research, project management, device trials, and registry studies to her role with Diamond. She is working in close collaboration with Diamond’s CRO partner, BioPharma Services, overseeing all aspects of the trial implementation including the data safety review process, clinical monitoring, sub-contractor relationship and data management.
Mr. Kerr's responsibilities at Diamond encompass financial strategy and investor relations. He brings over 13 years of management consulting, corporate development and investor relations experience to this role, spanning life sciences, technology and natural resources. Mr. Kerr has facilitated financing across multiple industries and advised family offices and private equity firms on acquisitions, dispositions, and asset management. This depth of knowledge led him to found Impavidus Consulting Group, a boutique management consulting and corporate development firm. Since 2011, Impavidus has worked with emerging and growth companies to fine-tune strategy, build long-term value and drive profitability and scale. For the past six years, Mr. Kerr has also worked with Epic Capital Management, providing strategic advisory and management consulting services to its portfolio, including three healthcare funds. As a participant in Epic's investment committee, Mr. Kerr has screened more than 500 health sector pitches and completed due diligence on over 125 prospects resulting in investments across 26 portfolio companies. He holds an HBA in Philosophy from the University of Toronto and has served on both public and not-for-profit boards.
Ms. Brown leads Diamond’s communications and branding efforts. She is a veteran and a trailblazer in marketing and advertising with a proven track record for helping clients increase market share and mindshare. In 2018, Ms. Brown founded Crowns, now a leading strategy, creative and media agency for the global cannabis industry. Before Crowns, she was the vice president of social media and content at the global creative agency, J. Walter Thompson. She is a sought-after thought leader, speaker and awards jurist who has lent her opinions on the business of cannabis to The Economist, Marketwatch, and BNN Bloomberg. Recent speaking engagements include The Economist Cannabis Summit, Cannabis Europa and MaRS Health Innovation Week. Recent awards juries include the Clio Awards and Effie Awards. Rebecca’s writing on marketing, branding and social media has appeared in Strategy Magazine, Applied Arts, The Globe and Mail and the National Post
Dr. Sellers is an internationally recognized authority on clinical psychopharmacology, pharmacogenetics, abuse liability assessment, and substance abuse. He has published more than 380 peer-reviewed papers and has been cited more than 37,000 times, with an h-index of 84. His focus areas include the acceleration of early-stage drug development through new methods and optimizing strategies to assess the abuse potential of new and re-formulated drugs. Dr. Sellers has worked with academic institutions, hospitals, government agencies, investors and biopharmaceutical and device companies. He was the co-founder of DecisionLine Clinical Research, a successful translational clinical research company. Dr. Sellers was the vice-president and director at the Clinical Institute of the Addiction Research Foundation, one of the world’s largest and best-known research and treatment organizations in the addiction field. He has served as a member of the World Health Organization (WHO) Expert Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence and chaired the Scientific Advisory Panel on Opiate Analgesic Abuse for the Therapeutic Products Directorate of Health Canada. He sits on the scientific advisory boards of many pharmaceutical and device companies. Dr. Sellers has received numerous awards, including the Rawls Palmer Progress in Medicine Award (1987 ASCPT), the Nathan B. Eddy Award (2012 CPDD), and the Oscar B. Hunter Award (2014, ASCPT). He is professor emeritus of pharmacology and toxicology, medicine and psychiatry at the University of Toronto where he received his medical degree in 1965. Dr. Sellers’ PhD in pharmacology is from Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Tyler is a leader in neurotechnology and neuromodulation. He is Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Co-Director of the Center for Engagement in Health Disability and Rehabilitation Sciences at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Tyler's focus is on the development of non-invasive neuromodulation methods and devices to optimize human performance and brain health and technologies to treat neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. He is also co-founder of neurotechnology company IST LLC. Dr. Tyler has a Ph.D. in Behavioral Neuroscience from the University of Alabama-Birmingham and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard.
Dr. Moskal has spent over 25 years working to discover and develop new therapies for brain and nervous system disorders. He was formerly CSO of Aptinyx Inc. (Nasdaq: APTX), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on novel NMDA receptor modulators. Dr. Moskal founded and served as the CSO of biopharmaceutical company Naurex Inc. , until its acquisition by Allergan (NYSE: AGN) for $1.7 billion in 2015. Dr. Moskal is a recipient of multiple honours, including the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) College of Fellows and the National Academy of Inventors (NAI) 2017 Class of Fellows. He followed his BS and PhD from the University of Notre Dame with a position as staff fellow at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) before becoming director of the neurosurgical laboratories at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. He is presently a distinguished professor of biomedical engineering at Northwestern University and director of the Falk Center for Molecular Therapeutics.
Dr. Glue is a psychiatrist whose research focuses on clinical and basic science to investigate the pharmacology of psychiatric drug treatments and the disease mechanisms of neurological and psychiatric disorders. He has developed several methods to assess central receptor sensitivity in patients (e.g. GABA-benzodiazepine in panic disorder; dopamine D1/D5 in cocaine dependence). He has used these methods to identify possible novel therapeutic agents and has tested over 20 novel agents in first-in-man or first-in-patient studies. Within the last five years, he was the principal investigator (PI) on commercially-sponsored, first-in-man and first-in-patient trials of noribogaine to treat symptoms of opioid withdrawal and controlled release ketamine tablets for treatment-resistant depression.
Dr. Glue graduated from Otago Medical School in 1980. He trained in psychiatry in New Zealand and the United Kingdom, becoming a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (MRCPsych) in 1986 and a fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (FRCPsych) in 2010. In 1987, Dr. Glue moved to the United States to conduct preclinical neuroscience research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). He returned to the United Kingdom to complete an additional medical degree in clinical psychopharmacology at the University of Bristol, which he received in 1992. He spent 18 years in the United States leading translational clinical pharmacology research for top-tier pharmaceutical companies. This included many years in New York heading the clinical pharmacology and neurosciences group for Pfizer Inc. Dr. Glue is currently the Hazel Buckland Chair of psychological medicine at the School of Medical Sciences of the University of Otago in his home country of New Zealand. He has published extensively, with more than 300 papers, book chapters and abstracts to his name. There are 13 patents or applications relating to his work.
Dr. Kosten is the J.H. Waggoner chair and a professor of psychiatry, pharmacology, immunology, pathology and neuroscience, and director emeritus of the Dan L. Duncan Institute for Clinical and Translational Research at Baylor College of Medicine. Other key appointments include distinguished professor of psychiatry at Peking University Medical School, adjunct professor of epidemiology and behavioral sciences at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, professor of psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine, and professor of psychology at the University of Houston. Dr. Kosten served as the Chief of Mental Health for the VA Connecticut Healthcare System. He is the founding vice-chair for addiction psychiatry of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, and past president of both the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry (AAAP) and the College on Problems of Drug Dependence (CPDD). He is a distinguished life fellow in the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and a fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP) . He has served as a congressional fellow in the US House of Representatives and is a long-standing member of various commissions with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) as well as advisory boards for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Department of Defense (DOD) . Dr. Kosten is the current editor of the American Journal on Addictions and past editor for the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse. He has over 750 publications on pharmacotherapy for addictions supported by over 50 grants from NIH, VA, DOD and various foundations in the USA and China. Dr. Kosten has been named “Top Doc” in psychiatry and is in the top 1% of US physicians nationwide.
Dr. Passie is a professor of psychiatry and psychotherapy at Hannover Medical School in Hannover, Germany and an internationally recognized authority on the pharmacology and therapeutic use of psychedelics.
Dr. Passie is also a visiting scientist at the Senckenberg Institute of History and Ethics in Medicine at Goethe University Frankfurt. He is the former director of the Laboratory for Neurocognition and Consciousness at Hannover Medical School and has done extensive research on the therapeutic potential of hallucinogenic drugs. Dr. Passie was a visiting professor at Harvard Medical School from 2012 to 2015.
Dr. Passie has published numerous articles in prestigious scientific journals and is the author of The Science of Microdosing Psychedelics (2019). This book set the standard for understanding the microdosing of psychedelics such as psilocybin. Other books by Dr. Passie include The Pharmacology of LSD (2010), Healing with Entactogens (2012) and The History of MDMA (2021).
He studied philosophy and sociology at Leibniz-University Hannover and medicine at Hannover Medical School. His medical dissertation was on existential psychiatry. He worked at the Psychiatric University Clinic in Zürich (Switzerland) and with Professor Hanscarl Leuner (Göttingen), the leading European authority on hallucinogens. At Hannover Medical School, Dr. Passie directed the Laboratory for Neurocognition and Consciousness. Dr. Passie has done extensive research on altered states of consciousness and their healing potential, including research involving cannabis, ketamine, nitrous oxide, LSD, MDMA, psilocybin.
Mr. Boadway’s 40-year career spans the areas of technology development, financing and monetization, both in public and private corporations. He will help Diamond optimize the investment in, and monetization of, its critically important intellectual property. Mr. Boadway also brings expertise in strategy and corporate governance drawn from his career, including his most recent role as CEO of Longitude Licensing Limited, a private equity-backed patent assertion entity specializing in the global licensing of significant patent portfolios. Longitude was acquired by IPValue Management Group in 2016. Presently, Mr. Boadway serves as chair of Romaeris Corporation and is president and CEO of River Ventures Inc. Other appointments held have included VP of patent brokerage at TechInsights; EVP, CFO and board member of MOSAID Technologies (now Conversant Intellectual Property Management); and CFO and president of Megalith Technologies. His engineering degree and MBA are from Queen’s University, and he holds the ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors
A veteran of the pharmaceutical services industry, Mr. Pekos founded Dalton Pharma Services in Toronto in 1986 and has managed all phases of its 30-years of growth. A leading supplier of contract drug development and manufacturing services to the global pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industries, Dalton has more than 110 employees and occupies a stand-alone 42,000 square foot facility. Strategically situated in the heart of one of North America's largest biomedical clusters, Dalton provides pharma and biotech clients worldwide with an array of integrated services.
Mr. Pekos began his academic career at the University of Toronto, obtaining a chemistry and biochemistry double specialist degree with a minor in biology. He went on to complete a master's degree in synthetic chemistry at York University. Mr. Pekos serves on the board of directors of Cardiol Therapeutics; a nanotherapeutics company focused on the research and commercial development of proprietary drug formulations for the treatment of heart failure. He is a member of the business advisory board for Critical Outcome Technologies, a publicly owned Canadian drug discovery company.
One of Canada's top health science executives, Ms. Blumstock has over 25 years of venture capital and private equity experience, spanning early to late-stage investments in life sciences and biotechnology. She has spent more than ten years as the executive director of corporate development at Toronto Innovation Acceleration Partners (TIAP), formerly known as MaRS Innovation. TIAP specializes in venture building for early-stage health science technologies and takes leading-edge research from discovery to market. Before this, Ms. Blumstock was a principal with Genesys Capital, one of the largest Canadian-based venture-capital firms focused exclusively on the life sciences industry. She was a partner with RBC Capital Partners life sciences fund. Ms. Blumstock was also the director of biological and pharmaceutical research at Drug Royalty Corporation (now DRI Capital Inc.), which provides financial solutions in exchange for royalties to health-related organizations worldwide. She is an advisor to the preclinical biotechnology company Bright Angel Therapeutics, and to Bitnobi, a privacy protected data sharing platform. Ms. Blumstock has an MBA in finance from Columbia Business School in New York. Her BSc in biology is from the University of Toronto.
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That's why Diamond is working with the mobile health research platform Quantified Citizen and the Ontario Brain Institute on the Attitudes Towards Psychedelics study.
Attitudes Towards Psychedelics is a global survey of attitudes and beliefs towards psychedelics.
Whether you have never tried a psychedelic or use them regularly, we are interested in learning from you!
Data from the study will provide researchers with an improved understanding of people's opinions, experiences and possible concerns about using psychedelic compounds to treat mental health conditions. These insights may help ensure that psychedelic treatments in development will be accessible to broad patient cohorts with varying backgrounds and beliefs.
