The Food and Drug Administration in the United States has agreed to let researchers carry out clinical trials using MDMA for medical treatment.
The hope is that the drug could be used to help treat people with severe psychological and emotional damage caused by traumas like war or violent abuse. Eventually, it could pave the way for legalisation of ecstasy in a similar way to cannabis.
Trials will be held in the US and will involve at least 230 patients. They will be sponsored by an organisation called the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS).
"Prior to its placement into the most restrictive category of drug regulation in the US and internationally, uncontrolled published reports suggested that the substituted phenethylamine 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), when administered in conjunction with psychotherapy, could yield substantial benefits for those afflicted with a variety of disorders," explained the prospective study outline in the Journal of Psychoparmacology .
MDMA creates feelings of euphoria in the emotion-processing centre of the brain called the amygdala - a pair of almond-shaped groups of nuclei inside the temporal lobes.
It does this without the strong hallucinogenic properties of LSD, which makes it better suited to medicine.
In the UK the drug is a class A substance and can often be cut with other drugs on the street that diminish its purity and cause unpredictable reactions.
The Mirror has contacted the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulation Agency (MHRA) to find out whether similar trials will ever be carried out here.
"Any clinical trial of an investigational medicinal product would need to have regulatory approval from MHRA and a positive ethical opinion before it could begin in the UK," a spokesperson from the department told us.
"The product under investigation would need to be made to an appropriate standard (ie under Good Manufacturing Practice; ‘GMP’) and the MHRA would ensure that the potential benefits of the study outweigh the risks to the subjects and that appropriate safeguards are in place.
"For substances like MDMA, Home office approval to possess the substance would also be required."
If the drug is successfully trailed in the US then it could be legally available to use as a treatment in psychotherapy by 2021.
“The body of evidence that shows MDMA works is so strong and so encouraging,” said Rick Doblin, the founder and executive director of MAPS at a conference in the United States last month.