The development of compulsive alcohol consumption would be linked to a cerebral circuit, which would make it possible to accurately predict the onset of this behavior.
Why do only some people develop an addiction to alcohol? This is the question answered by US-based researchers from the Salk Institute for Biological Studiesof Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and of the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory.
Medial prefrontal cortex and periaqueductal gray matter involved
By studying neuronal activity in the medial prefrontal cortex and in the periaqueductal gray matter of the mice they were working on, the scientists found that the development of compulsive alcohol consumption was linked to neuronal communication patterns between these two regions. of the brain.
The works researchers, published in the American scientific journal Scienceshow that the circuit they discovered serves as a biomarker to accurately predict future compulsive drinking, even weeks before the behavior begins.
Optogenetics to increase and decrease compulsive alcohol consumption
While the team went so far as to use optogenetics to control neural pathway activity (they were thus able to increase and decrease compulsive drinking), they were originally interested in the way in which “binge drinking” (or “significant occasional alcoholization”) impairs the brain leading to compulsive alcohol consumption.
“In the process, we came across a surprising discovery,” says Cody Siciliano, first author of the study and assistant professor in the department of pharmacology at Vanderbilt University, in a article published on the website of the Salk Institute. We were really able to predict which animals would become compulsive based on their neural activity during the very first time they drank alcohol.”
A cerebral circuit specific to alcohol?
The researchers do not intend to stop at this discovery. “We don’t know if this brain circuit is specific to alcohol or if the same circuit is involved in different compulsive behaviors, such as those relating to other substances or the abuse of natural rewards; so it’s something that we need to study”, believes Kay Tye, neuroscientist, Professor and Wylie Vale Chair at the Salk Institute.
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