(Press-News.org) EAST LANSING, Mich. --- Scientists have discovered a molecular process in the brain triggered by cocaine use that could provide a target for treatments to prevent or reverse addiction to the drug.
Reporting in the Journal of Neuroscience, Michigan State University neuroscientist A.J. Robison and colleagues say cocaine alters the nucleus accumbens, the brain's pleasure center that responds to stimuli such as food, sex and drugs.
"Understanding what happens molecularly to this brain region during long-term exposure to drugs might give us insight into how addiction occurs," said Robison, assistant professor in the Department of Physiology and the Neuroscience Program.
The researchers found that cocaine causes cells in the nucleus accumbens to boost production of two proteins, one associated with addiction and the other related to learning. The proteins have a reciprocal relationship -- they increase each other's production and stability in the cells -- so the result is a snowball effect that Robison calls a feed-forward loop.
Robison and colleagues demonstrated that loop's essential role in cocaine responses by manipulating the process in rodents. They found that raising production of the protein linked to addiction made animals behave as if they were exposed to cocaine even when they weren't. They also were able to break the loop, disrupting rodents' response to cocaine by preventing the function of the learning protein.
"At every level that we study, interrupting this loop disrupts the process that seems to occur with long-term exposure to drugs," said Robison, who conducted the study as a postdoctoral fellow at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City before joining the faculty at MSU.
Robison said the study was particularly compelling because it found signs of the same feed-forward loop in the brains of people who died while addicted to cocaine.
"The increased production of these proteins that we found in the animals exposed to drugs was exactly paralleled in a population of human cocaine addicts," he said. "That makes us believe that the further experiments and manipulations we did in the animals are directly relevant to humans."
Robison said the growing understanding of addiction at the molecular level could help pave the way for new treatments for addicts.
"This sort of molecular pathway could be interrupted using genetic medicine, which is what we did with the mice," he said. "Many researchers think that is the future of medicine."
###
Michigan State University has been working to advance the common good in uncommon ways for more than 150 years. One of the top research universities in the world, MSU focuses its vast resources on creating solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges, while providing life-changing opportunities to a diverse and inclusive academic community through more than 200 programs of study in 17 degree-granting colleges.
Discovery could yield treatment for cocaine addicts
2013-03-15
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
'Dirty blizzard' in Gulf may account for missing Deepwater Horizon oil
2013-03-15
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Oil from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill acted as a catalyst for plankton and other surface materials to clump together and fall to the sea floor in a massive sedimentation event that researchers are calling a "dirty blizzard."
Jeff Chanton, the John Widmer Winchester Professor of Oceanography in the Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science at Florida State University, is one of the members of the Deep-C Consortium who presented the dirty blizzard hypothesis at a recent conference in New Orleans that focused on the effects of the oil spill ...
Tau transmission model opens doors for new Alzheimer's, Parkinson's therapies
2013-03-15
SAN DIEGO – Injecting synthetic tau fibrils into animal models induces Alzheimer's-like tau tangles and imitates the spread of tau pathology, according to research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania being presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 65th Annual Meeting in San Diego March 16-23, 2013.
This Alzheimer's research, along with additional Parkinson's research from Penn and beyond, further demonstrates the cell-to-cell transmission of neurodegenerative proteins. John Q. Trojanowski, MD, PhD, co-director of the Center for ...
Kessler Foundation researchers share findings in rehabilitation research at AAN meeting in San Diego
2013-03-15
West Orange, NJ. March 15, 2013. Kessler Foundation scientists and their colleagues will discuss their progress in rehabilitation research at the upcoming 65th Annual American Academy of Neurology Conference at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, CA, March 16 – 23.
A.M. Barrett, MD, director of Stroke Rehabilitation at Kessler Foundation will present on Pharmacologic Enhancement of Stroke Rehabilitation on Friday March 22, 2013 as part of a Specialty in Focus session on Neurorehabilitation Enhancement Techniques. This session addresses the contribution of brain ...
Study offers new insights on invasive fly threatening US fruit crops
2013-03-15
Humans aren't the only species with a sweet tooth. Research from North Carolina State University shows that the invasive spotted-wing vinegar fly (Drosophila suzukii) also prefers sweet, soft fruit – giving us new insight into a species that has spread across the United States over the past four years and threatens to cause hundreds of millions of dollars in damage to U.S. fruit crops.
"Because we know that D. suzukii prefers softer, sweeter fruit, we can focus our research efforts into which wild fruits may serve as reservoirs for this species and help identify new crops ...
Report: Communications technology among tools needed to aid miner safety
2013-03-15
COLUMBUS, Ohio—A new National Academy of Sciences report identifies tools that would help miners devise their own means of escape when trapped underground.
In part, the report suggests that The National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) work closely with technology companies to develop new communications and tracking devices—ones that keep working underground after a mining accident.
It also suggests that NIOSH and MSHA work with mining companies to enable frequent escape drills and extensive training ...
Mindfulness at school reduces likelihood of depression-related symptoms in adolescents
2013-03-15
Mindfulness is a form of meditation therapy focused on exercising 'attentiveness'. Depression is often rooted in a downward spiral of negative feelings and worries. Once a person learns to more quickly recognise these feelings and thoughts, he or she can intervene before depression sinks in.
While mindfulness has already been widely tested and applied in patients with depression, this is the first time the method has been studied in a large group of adolescents in a school-based setting, using a randomised controlled design. The study was carried out at five middle schools ...
New NIST microscope measures nanomagnet property vital to 'spintronics'
2013-03-15
VIDEO:
Animation of spin waves excited by a transient magnetic field pulse in a nanomagnet, as simulated with NIST micromagnetics software (Object Oriented MicroMagnetic Framework, or OOMMF).
Click here for more information.
Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new microscope able to view and measure an important but elusive property of the nanoscale magnets used in an advanced, experimental form of digital memory. The new instrument ...
New research paper says we are still at risk of the plague
2013-03-15
Today archaeologists unearthed a 'Black Death' grave in London, containing more than a dozen skeletons of people suspected to have died from the plague. The victims are thought to have died during the 14th century and archaeologists anticipate finding many more as they excavate the site.
The Plague is by definition a re-emerging infectious disease which affects the lungs and is highly contagious, leading to mass outbreaks across populations. History shows us that population levels suffered globally due to the plague, with around 75 million people globally perishing during ...
Lost frog DNA revived: Lazarus Project
2013-03-15
The genome of an extinct Australian frog has been revived and reactivated by a team of scientists using sophisticated cloning technology to implant a "dead" cell nucleus into a fresh egg from another frog species.
The bizarre gastric-brooding frog, Rheobatrachus silus – which uniquely swallowed its eggs, brooded its young in its stomach and gave birth through its mouth - became extinct in 1983.
But the Lazarus Project team has been able to recover cell nuclei from tissues collected in the 1970s and kept for 40 years in a conventional deep freezer. The "de-extinction" ...
Dating in middle school leads to higher dropout, drug-use rates
2013-03-15
Athens, Ga. – Students who date in middle school have significantly worse study skills, are four times more likely to drop out of school and report twice as much alcohol, tobacco and marijuana use than their single classmates, according to new research from the University of Georgia.
"Romantic relationships are a hallmark of adolescence, but very few studies have examined how adolescents differ in the development of these relationships," said Pamela Orpinas, study author and professor in the College of Public Health and head of the Department of Health Promotion and ...