NPP BrainPod
BrainPod is the podcast from the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, produced in association with Nature Publishing Group. It delves into the latest basic and clinical research advancing understanding of the brain and behavior, featuring highlighted content from a top journal in neuroscience, psychiatry, and pharmacology. Listeners get access to original papers and reviews featured in the podcast by subscribing to Neuropsychopharmacology.
Episodes
Incentive salience, not psychomotor sensitization or tolerance, drives escalation of cocaine self-administration in heterogeneous stock rats
There are a number of theories that have been studied to try to explain addiction and drug use escalation, and thus to also create animal models of that behavior that can then serve to help develop treatments. One theory for escalation is that people feel worse and worse over time and so they take the drug to feel better. Another is that they just don’t get as much of a reaction to the drug and so
Oxytocin neurons in the anterior and posterior paraventricular nucleus have distinct behavioral functions and electrophysiological profiles
Oxytocin has become known for having anti-anxiety and affiliative behavioral effects. That’s why clinicians and researchers are excited about using oxytocin as a potential therapeutic. Brian Trainor is a professor at UC Davis, and his lab has been studying this complexity for the past decade. For an animal model, they work with a territorial, aggressive, monogamous rodent species called Calif
The genetics of cannabis lifetime use
Cannabis, which is increasingly legally available, both for therapeutic and recreational use, is now one of the most commonly used drugs worldwide. Of people who have ever used cannabis, studies vary, but they estimate that about 10-25 percent of people who use cannabis go on to develop cannabis use disorder.Uri Bright is a postdoctoral associate at the Yale School of Medicine and is one of t
Older and wiser? The neural correlates of worry induction and reappraisal in older adults
Worry seems like something most people do from time to time, but for some people, severe worry can become an overwhelming sensation, and for older adults later in life, severe worry has been associated with an increased risk of stroke and coronary heart disease. Carmen Andreescu is a professor of psychiatry and bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She says mild worry
Grey matter morphometry in young adult e-cigarette users, tobacco cigarette users & non-using controls
There’s been a fair amount of animal data suggesting that nicotine can affect the developing brain, but there hadn’t been the equivalent human studies done on people whose brains are still developing. And today there are two predominant forms of nicotine delivery - tobacco cigarettes, and e-cigarettes, or vaping.Laurie Zawertailo is a senior scientist at the Center for Addiction and Mental Health
Validation of L-type calcium channel blocker amlodipine as a novel ADHD treatment through cross-species analysis, drug-target Mendelian randomization, and clinical evidence from medical records
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, is a common condition that, for a lot of people, is difficult to treat. The drugs that exist have a number of adverse side effects, and about 25 percent of patients don’t respond to existing drugs. And so a team of researchers in Iceland, led by Karl Karlsson, professor of biomolecular engineering at Reykjavik University, undertook a number of dif
Rapid and sustained antidepressant effects of vaporized N,N-Dimethyltryptamine: A Phase 2a clinical trial in Treatment-Resistant Depression.
Draulio Araujo, professor at the Brain Institute in the University of Rio Grande Norte in Natal, Brazil, has been studying ayahuasca for more than 20 years. It’s a psychedelic plant used in rituals in South America that has also been researched for its potential to treat depression. The effects of ayahuasca can last for hours and also lead to side effects including vomiting and diarrhea. The activ
Endocannabinoid contributions to the perception of socially relevant, affective touch in humans
New drugs that target the endocannabinoid system are being proposed for disorders that are usually characterized by the dysregulation of social processing, like social anxiety disorder and autism spectrum disorder. Researchers have been trying to understand the mechanisms for how these drugs work. Leah Mayo is assistant professor at the University of Calgary, and she’s one of the authors of a
Sex differences in sensitivity to dopamine receptor manipulations of risk-based decision making in rats
The scientific literature has shown that females demonstrate more aversion to risk-taking than males. Studies have also demonstrated that the basal lateral amygdala, or BLA, is a critical hub for processing risk and reward information. And yet further research has shown that activity in the amygdala differs between males and females, and that the expression of particular dopamine receptors called
Biomarker development for menstrual Cycle affective change: the need for greater temporal, mechanistic, and phenotypic specificity.
The menstrual cycle is known to affect things like mood and changes in pain. But there can also be symptoms that have a serious impact on a person’s function, ability to work, ability to maintain friendships and romantic relationships. This is a rare condition known as premenstrual dysphoric disorder. But it’s not the only psychiatric condition that can worsen with changes in the menstrual cycle.
Genome-wide association studies of coffee intake in UK/US participants of European ancestry uncover cohort-specific genetic associations
Researchers are interested in understanding the biology of why some people are more likely to overconsume substances. Some substances are difficult to study—people might not admit to illegal substance abuse or to how much alcohol they drink. But Americans are more likely to accurately recall and share how much coffee they drink—which is related to how much caffeine they consume. And so a team of r
C-reactive protein moderates associations between racial discrimination and ventromedial prefrontal cortex activation during attention to threat in Black American women
Scientists have been amassing an increasing amount of evidence about the impact of racial discrimination and racial trauma, including how it can have an impact on brain regions involved with threat vigilance and emotional regulation. At the same time, there’s evidence that increased engagement in those areas has been linked to increased risk of mental health problems like depression, and they also
Ghrelin decreases sensitivity to negative feedback and increases prediction-error related caudate activity in humans, a randomized controlled trial
There’s a hormone called ghrelin that’s secreted in the stomach, and when someone is hungry it contributes to that feeling of hunger and the need to search for food. But neurological studies have suggested that ghrelin might also play a role in compulsivity and impulsivity, and it might be related to substance use disorders.Rebecca Boeme is an assistant professor at Linkoping University in Sweden.
Spotlighting SHAPERS: Sex hormones associated with psychological and endocrine roles
Dr. Nicole Petersen is an assistant professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at UCLA. Her commentary is a new paper in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, called “Spotlighting SHAPERS: sex hormones associated with psychological and endocrine roles.” Dr. Petersen starts the paper describing an unnamed signaling molecule that can affect the physical structure of the brain a
Comparable roles for serotonin in rats and humans for computations underlying flexible decision-making
Serotonin is a critical chemical when it comes to a number of psychiatric conditions, such as OCD, where it seems to play a particular role in cognitive flexibility. That is, serotonin levels are related to the fact that someone is perseverating on intrusive thoughts or compulsions and isn’t able to be as flexible as otherwise would be necessary.Trevor Robbins, professor of cognitive neuroscience
Integrating public health and translational basic science to address challenges of xylazine adulteration of fentanyl
The drug naloxone, otherwise known as Narcan, is a critical tool in reversing fentanyl overdoses and reducing mortality. But now fentanyl is appearing on the streets adulterated with a drug called xylazine. Justin Strickland, assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and Cassandra Gipson-Reichardt, associate professor in the department of pharmacology nutritional sci
The why, when, where, how, and so what of so-called rapidly acting antidepressants
Sanjay Mathew is a professor and vice chair for research at Baylor College of Medicine and director of the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program. He’s one of the two authors of a recent review paper in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, “The why, when, where, how, and so what of so-called rapidly acting antidepressants.” With his colleague Alan Schatzberg, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sci
AI-based analysis of social media language predicts addiction treatment dropout at 90 days
In-person treatment for substance use disorders is an incredibly important tool, but there’s a high failure rate — more than 50 percent of people who enter drop out within the first month. There hasn’t been a highly accurate method of identifying who might leave and who might succeed, and knowing this could help centers allocate resources to give the right type of assistance to the right people at
Oxytocin effects on amygdala reactivity to angry faces in males and females with ASPD
Antisocial personality disorder, or ASPD, is a difficult disorder to study. There have been studies on psychopathic individuals, and on youth with psychopathic traits, but most studies on ASPD to date have been on incarcerated adults. A team of researchers at Heidelberg University wanted to study individuals who are not incarcerated and see what these findings could elucidate about the brains, in
To dismantle structural racism in science, scientists need to learn how it works
It’s clear there are diversity issues in science, both in terms of who does or doesn’t receive research grants, as well as who is or isn’t represented at the highest levels of scientific research. When Caleb Weinreb and Daphne Sun began their PhD program at Harvard University Medical School in systems biology, they took this on as an issue. They learned from others in their department, and they ev
Low doses of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) increase reward-related brain activity
Psychedelic drugs have received attention recently for their potential use as treatments for psychiatric disorders. Single, high doses of LSD have shown promise for treating depressive disorders. But there’s another way in which people have been using LSD, and it’s what’s known as micro-dosing, taking LSD at below noticeable levels, where it doesn’t seem to have a psychedelic impact—but users say
Sex-dependent risk factors for PTSD: a prospective structural MRI study
After a traumatic event, women are more likely to be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Research has been conducted on what might be causing this higher rate of diagnoses; for instance, perhaps women had more cumulative trauma in their lives than the men in question. But scientists say that even taking prior childhood trauma into account, women are still diagnosed at a higher
Sex differences in appetitive and reactive aggression
Maladaptive aggression, while not a diagnosable neuropsychiatric disorder on its own, often presents as an important comorbid condition with other neuropsychiatric disorders. But while both men and women can and do display aggression, there’s been a bias to thinking of aggression, in both its adaptive and maladaptive forms, as a male behavior. Sam Golden is an assistant professor at the Unive
What’s wrong with my experiment?: The impact of hidden variables on neuropsychopharmacology research
Sometimes, when researchers are conducting an experiment, the results are confusing. Maybe the control group of animals doesn’t behave the way a control should in theory be behaving. Maybe a researcher repeats a study and sees results that are unusually different from the first time around. The answers to these issues might lie in something called ‘hidden variables,’ according to a new study title
A scientific approach to navigating the academic job market
Kirstie Cummings and Sofia Beas are both new assistant professors in the department of neurobiology at the University of Alabama, Birmingham. When they met, they discussed the job application process, their support network, and their own personal processes, and they decided to write an article that could serve as a resource for candidates from different backgrounds, many of whom might not have the
Identification of THC impairment using functional brain imaging
Driving while under the influence of THC, known as drugged driving, is becoming more of an issue as more states legalize cannabis for both medical and recreational use around the country. THC is known to impair cognitive and psychomotor performance and thus impair driving. Jodi Gilman is a neuroscientist and an associate professor of psychiatry at Mass General Hospital and Harvard Medical School,
Evolution of prefrontal cortex
In the past, there had been a school of thought that looked at evolution linearly — that is, you could in theory draw a line among mammals as they evolved, and so, say, rodent brains would basically be less evolved primate brains. That turns out not to be true; evolution is much more like a branching tree, and each branch then goes on to develop independently, sometimes in parallel. Some groups of
Astrocyte-neuron signaling in the mesolimbic dopamine system: the hidden stars of dopamine signaling
Star-shaped cells called astrocytes are the most abundant cells to be found in the human brain. In the past, they’d been thought to play a supporting role to neurons, such as providing metabolic support, but recently they’re also emerging as stars of information processing. They can respond to neurotransmitters and release neuroactive substances that then affect synaptic transmission and plasticit
Neurobiology of loneliness: a systematic review
Loneliness is a subjective experience, but neuroscientists define it as a distress that arrives from a discrepancy between perceived and desired social relationships. There may be an evolutionary benefit to the feeling of loneliness; we’re a social species, and feeling lonely might have sent us to seek out other humans, which has been very important for survival. Moreover, if gone unaddressed and
Medial orbitofrontal cortex dopamine D1/D2 receptors differentially modulate distinct forms of probabilistic decision-making
It’s known that dopamine transmission in the brain, particularly in the frontal lobes, can affect decision-making and can regulate choices when it comes to actions and rewards. But the effect of dopamine transition in the medial orbital frontal cortex hasn’t yet been studied, and dysfunction in that region has been implicated in a variety of mental illnesses, including obsessive compulsive disorde
Addiction as a brain disease revised: why it still matters, and the need for consilience
Nearly 25 years ago, a paper was published about addiction that transformed the field. The director of the US National Institute on Drug Abuse at the time called addiction a “brain disease,” and he wrote a paper articulating this position and the agenda that it implied. It led to a focus on researching the brain to understand the mechanisms behind addiction, which could lead to novel treatments. A
Big data in psychiatry: multiomics, neuroimaging, computational modeling, and digital phenotyping
The world of medicine has been changing rapidly due to the increasing use of ‘big data.’ And there’s been a major revolution in this approach in neuroscience and psychiatry as well: computing power, sample sizes, neuroimaging technologies, digital approaches to phenotyping, and computational modeling all are already starting to unleash dramatic new understandings of the brain, as well as new appro
Acute dose-dependent effects of lysergic acid diethylamide in a double-blind placebo-controlled study in healthy subjects
Interest is growing in the use of the psychedelic drug LSD for psychiatric research and even potentially for treatment. But placebo-controlled studies conducted to date have used just one dose of the drug—none have investigated the impacts of a variety of dosages within the same subjects. In addition, past studies did not use pharmaceutically-defined dosages of LSD, which has made verifying the ef
Big behavior: challenges and opportunities in a new era of deep behavior profiling
Scientists who study neuropsychiatric conditions and treatments often use rodent models to do so. From depression to anxiety to memory impairment and impulsivity, there are certain rodent behaviors that are used to represent these types of conditions in humans. And to use these models, researchers have had to watch the animals live or on video and jot down every instance of, say, exploratory behav
Leveraging large genomic datasets to illuminate the pathobiology of autism spectrum disorders
The application of the study of genetics and the use of big data to identify patterns of inheritance as well as de novo mutations has had a dramatic impact on the field of Autism Spectrum Disorder research, and it offers pathways to a greater understanding of biological mechanisms, even potentially treatments. Matthew State, chair of the department of psychiatry at University of California San Fra
Pubertal adversity alters chromatin dynamics and stress circuitry in the pregnant brain
It’s understood in epidemiological research that women who experience trauma during puberty are at significantly higher risk for affective disorders such as depression and anxiety when they become pregnant. And so Tracy Bale, a professor in the departments of psychology and psychiatry at the University of Maryland in Baltimore, has done several studies using mice to try to model and understand thi
Social networking and mental health: looking beyond frequency of use and towards mechanisms of action
Over the past decades, there’s clearly been a dramatic increase in the amount of time people spend online using social networking sites. For instance, Facebook and Instagram have literally billions of users. At the same time, there’s been a rise in mental health issues for young people from teens through their mid 20s. The rise in these issues has been seen particularly for Millennials and the I g
Distinct acute effects of LSD, MDMA, and D-amphetamine in healthy subjects
A number of drugs that are used recreationally are now being studied for their use in psychopharmacology. But while the ways in which these drugs are similar or different has been described anecdotally by recreational users, they haven’t been studied in comparison to one another. Dr. Matthias Liechti and his team of researchers recently published a study in the journal Neuropsychopharmac
Chronic opioid pretreatment potentiates the sensitization of fear learning by trauma
It’s known that there’s a relationship between post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, and a higher rate of opioid abuse. What isn’t understood, though, is what that relationship is. Does PTSD cause people to turn to opioids in particular among all the potential drugs of abuse, or is there something about opioid use that makes users particularly sensitive to trauma?This is just what Michael Fanse
Effects of MDMA on attention to positive social cues and pleasantness of affective touch.
The recreational drug MDMA, also known as Ecstasy or Molly, is particularly popular in social settings and raves, in large part because of how socially connected it makes the users feel. It's being studied for use in psychotherapy — there's a phase III clinical trial for the use of MDMA to treat PTSD. What's clear is that the drug affects how users experience social interactions. But there are que
Superolateral medial forebrain bundle deep brain stimulation in major depression: a gateway trial.
Depression is an incredibly important disorder—according to Thomas Schlaepfer, head of the department of interventional biological psychiatry at the University of Freiburg, at least 20 percent of people have a depressive episode at least once in their lives. And while most patients' symptoms improve with a combination of psychotherapy and medicine, up to 20 percent of depressed patients do not imp
Cues play a critical role in estrous cycle-dependent enhancement of cocaine reinforcement
Research has demonstrated that, overall, women are more vulnerable to drug addiction than men are. They become addicted more quickly after first using, they have a harder time staying off drugs, and they relapse at higher rates. But most studies have focused on men, and models that have been developed nearly entirely focus on male subjects. Now, two things are changing the situation: scientists ar
Food Addiction: A Valid Concept?
Over the past decade, the use of the term 'food addiction' to describe an unhealthy approach to eating has grown. It refers to the idea that, for some people, their inability to control their food intake has similarities to that of a drug of abuse. Paul Kenny is the chair of the Department of Neuroscience at the Icahn School of Medicine in New York. He's one of two authors of a recent circumspecti
Sex Matters
As our environment becomes ever increasingly complex, understanding how sex differences impact disease risk and resilience will only become more critical. The 2019 , "Sex Matters," edited by Dr. Tracy L. Bale, highlights the causal and mechanistic value in cases where significant sex differences are found, as well as when they're not; where sex differences may arise at one period of life and disap
Recent advances in the study of aggression
Aggression is an evolutionary behavior seen throughout the animal world. When it comes to humans, however, some forms of aggression can be seen as pathological, dangerous, and quite costly to society. And yet there's a dearth of approved, effective treatments for aggression. Meghan Flanigan is a graduate student at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and one of the authors of a new article
Neurocognitive effects of umami: association with eating behavior and food choice
While the influence of sweet taste on neurocognitive function has been widely studied, umami or savory has received less of a research focus. Animal models and even some small human studies seem to show that umami given in a broth before a meal can influence appetite and food intake. And this inspired Dr. Miguel Alonso-Alonso, Assistant Professor and Director of the Laboratory of Bariatric and Nut
Burst activation of dopamine neurons produces prolonged post-burst availability of actively released dopamine.
For years now, scientists have noticed a rather strange phenomenon in animal models: scientists would stimulate dopamine production in the brain, but once the stimulation was over, the dopamine would remain. Bita Moghaddam is chair and professor of behavioral neuroscience at Oregon Health and Science University. She says that when dopamine is released, dopamine transporters take the dopamine back
Debating the Persistence of Neurogenesis in Humans
The question of whether neurogenesis persists in humans and for how long -- that is, whether and where humans grow new neurons in their brains, and how long into our lives -- is one that has engaged neuroscientists for decades. Some papers showed that humans did retain neurogenesis into adulthood, but the issue has been debated. That debate was reignited just recently with the publication of two n
Considerations for the Use of DREADDs in Behavioral Neuroscience
There's a technology that's proven to be increasingly useful in the past decade -- it's called DREADD, or "designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drugs." The current approach is to create a designer receptor that is unlocked by the drug, clozapine-n-oxide, or CNO. Researchers have used it to study the function of populations of neurons or of particular pathways in the brains in roden
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Cannabis and Cannabinoids: From Synapse to Society
The 2018 issue of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews, "Cannabis and Cannabinoids: From Synapse to Society," showcases the remarkable advances in the biology of cannabinoids and cannabis in the past two decades, ranging from their impact at the synaptic level through to public health.Edited by Margaret Haney and Matthew N Hill, this issue represents current findings across several major research areas
Opioid Release after High-Intensity Interval Training in Healthy Human Subjects
Many people who exercise regularly have experienced a so-called "runner's high," either a feeling of euphoria after exercise, or a feeling of happiness and well-being. Scientists have studied this and found that exercise does indeed improve mood and combat stress, for instance, but researchers at Finland's University of Turku wanted to know: Are endorphins being produced in and thus affecting the
Opioid Self-Administration is Attenuated by Early-Life Experience and Gene Therapy for Anti-Inflammatory IL-10 in the Nucleus Accumbens of Male Rats
Studies have shown that stress and trauma early in life can lead to an increased risk for drug addiction later in life. In rat models developed to mimic and study this effect, some rats received normal maternal care, while others received enriched maternal care - extra grooming and attention from their mothers. Those with enriched maternal care have been shown to be less likely to return to a room
Beta-Adrenoceptor Blockade in the Basolateral Amygdala, But Not the Medial Prefrontal Cortex, Rescues the Immediate Extinction Deficit
One method of treating Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) involves extinction therapy, but researchers have found that the timing of such therapy is extremely important, and that it often doesn't work if the therapy is conducted too soon after the initial trauma. Stress itself may be harming the efficacy of the treatment. A team of researchers at Texas A&M University conducted research to deter
Arbaclofen in Children and Adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder
Autism Spectrum Disorder is a disorder that has been defined by the medical community, but so far, none of the medications available for ASD treat the core symptoms of the disease, but rather secondary symptoms such as agitation or hyperactivity. Because ASD is genetically linked to Fragile X syndrome, researchers noticed that in a mouse model, the drug arbaclofen reduced what would be core sympto
The Gateway Hypothesis of Addiction
The National Institutes of Health recently published a statement requiring sex as a biological variable in studies. This is in part simply because it's good science, and in part to correct for decades in which both animal and human studies were largely conducted with male subjects. In their review paper responding to this statement, Dr. Tracy Bale and Dr. Neill Epperson discuss how sex has a direc
Sex as a Biological Variable: Who, What, When, Why, and How
The National Institutes of Health recently published a statement requiring sex as a biological variable in studies. This is in part simply because it's good science, and in part to correct for decades in which both animal and human studies were largely conducted with male subjects. In their review paper responding to this statement, Dr. Tracy Bale and Dr. Neill Epperson discuss how sex has a direc
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: The Immunology of Behavior - Exploring the Role of the Immune System in Brain Health and Illness
The 2017 issue of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews, "The Immunology of Behavior focuses on the growing appreciation of the immune system in understanding brain and health illness.This podcast synthesizes this year's issue, which showcases a wide range of reviews about the relationship between immunology and brain and health illness, demonstrating how advances in our understanding of immunology have
LSD Acutely Impairs Fear Recognition and Enhances Emotional Empathy and Sociality
LSD is not only a well-known psychedelic drug, but it was also studied extensively for its potential in psychotherapy in the early days of its use, about fifty years ago. Those early studies didn't necessarily meet today's standards for clinical trials, and previous research ended in the 1970s, due to changing regulations and a prohibition against LSD. Today, LSD is once again being studied for it
Harnessing Smartphone-Based Digital Phenotyping to Enhance Behavioral and Mental Health
Smartphones have become nearly ubiquitous in the United States. These mini-computers that we carry around in our bags or pockets have the potential to dramatically influence the practice of medicine, including psychiatry. A team of researchers is currently investigating the use of smartphones for what's known as digital phenotyping, or the continuous monitoring of someone's status via a personal d
Women at the Podium: ACNP Strives to Reach Speaker Gender Equality at the Annual Meeting
Lately, scientists have begun to pay closer attention to the numbers of men and women who present at scientific meetings. Even in those fields where women are a majority, men dominate speaking roles; in 2011, a group of leaders in neuroscience fields decided to remedy this situation. By the 2015 annual meeting of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, women made up 70% of the plenary spe
Abuse of New Psychoactive Substances: Threats and Solutions
There has been a recent and notable increase in the non-medical use of new psychoactive substances (NPS), or "designer drugs." Unlike classic drugs of abuse, many NPS were initially developed for research purposes. In this podcast, Drs. Michael Baumann and Nora Volkow discuss the complexities of working with these substances and how, given their genesis, research with NPS could be considered "dual
Does Cannabis Cause, Exacerbate or Ameliorate Psychiatric Disorders? An Oversimplified Debate Discussed
Marijuana use for medical purposes is becoming increasingly common in the U.S., and doctors prescribe it for ills ranging from headaches to insomnia. And yet, there is little scientific data supporting its medical use. In this podcast, Drs. Margaret Haney and Eden Evins discuss the relationship between cannabis use and two psychiatric disorders: post-traumatic stress disorder and psychotic illness
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Impact of Stress on the Brain: Pathology, Treatment and Prevention
"Impact of Stress on the Brain: Pathology, Treatment and Prevention," the 2016 issue of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews, focuses on advances in our understanding of the impact of stress on the brain: From pathology to circuits, treatment to prevention. Emerging data from genetics, epigenetics, neural circuit and intergenerational models, animal models, and neuroimaging all suggest that stress affe
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Neurodevelopment and the Origins of Brain Disorders
In this issue of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews, entitled Neurodevelopment and the Origins of Brain Disorders, subject discipline experts provide both experimental highlights and perspectives on the current understanding of basic mechanisms of neurodevelopment, the influence of developmental disruptions on childhood and adult-onset brain and behavioral disorders, and the emerging promise of trans
Caffeine consumption in adolescents
Adolescent consumption of caffeine, the most commonly used psychoactive stimulant in the world, has increased strikingly in recent years. Caffeine use has been associated with illicit drug use and risky behaviors, but whether consumption of caffeine during adolescence has effects on the mature brain is controversial. In this podcast, author Ryan Bachtell discusses his recent study, which found tha
The value of alcohol
The relative value of alcohol may be encoded by discrete regions of the brain, according to a study published in Neuropsychopharmacology. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), Dr. James MacKillop and colleagues examined brain activity in 24 male volunteers, who were heavy drinkers, while they were deciding whether or not to drink alcohol priced at various levels. Their findings ident
Brain changes in young smokers
Young adult smokers may experience alterations in brain structure related to cigarette exposure, dependence, and craving. The brain structure of adults has been shown to vary with smoking status, particularly in the insula—a part of the cerebral cortex involved in monitoring internal states and decision-making. In a study published in Neuropsychopharmacology, Dr. Edythe London and colleagues took
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Biomolecular Discovery: Mechanisms, Therapeutics, and Biomarkers in Neural Disorders
The 2014 issue of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews is entitled Biomolecular Discovery: Mechanisms, Therapeutics, and Biomarkers in Neural Disorders. The articles in this issue focus on recent advances in the detection, subtyping and monitoring of complex neural disease progression, the definition of new molecular targets for therapeutic intervention and biomarkers, with an emphasis on the use of ge
Smoking throughout pregnancy may contribute to emotional problems in children
Up to 25% of women in the U.S., Denmark and Sweden report smoking during pregnancy, despite associations of prenatal tobacco exposure with negative behavioral and cognitive outcomes. Hanan El Marroun and colleagues assessed brain morphology along with behavioral and emotional functioning of children whose mothers reported smoking in a range from one cigarette a day to more than 9 cigarettes per da
HIV infection may raise risk of cocaine abuse
Although psychostimulant abusers comprise one of the fastest growing populations of HIV-infected patients, relatively little is known about how HIV may impact the rewarding effects of abused drugs. Dr. Jay P. McLaughlin discusses how a protein associated with HIV infection, called HIV-1 Tat, may increase vulnerability for drug addiction. His research shows that mice who express HIV-1 Tat display a
A taste of alcohol
Dr. David Kareken discusses how the urge to drink can be triggered by sensory cues alone. His latest research showed that a dopamine reaction took place in the brain when men were given a small amount of alcohol - enough to taste, but not enough to become intoxicated. The reaction was stronger in those with a genetic predisposition to alcoholism. This suggests that dopamine is involved in the desi
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Epigenetics
Epigenetics is the modification of genetic expression without changing the underlying DNA, or how environment affects genetic potential. It is highly involved in learning and memory, as well as maladaptations caused by stress or drug abuse. Dr. Eric Nestler, one of the editors of this year's Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews, provides an overview of the topic here, including the somewhat controversi
Bath salts
Mephedrone and methylone are types of synthetic stimulant drugs that have been sold legally under names such as "bath salts" or "plant food". They can have a number of dangerous side effects, such as agitation, combativeness, and hallucinations. A recent court ruling has made many of these synthetic drugs illegal, but new variations continue to be available. In this latest podcast, Dr. Michael Bau
Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews: Neurotherapeutics
The brain is a daunting therapeutic challenge. This year's edition of Neuropsychopharmacology Reviews provides an update on treatments for brain disorders ranging from schizophrenia to neurodegeneration. Join Kerri Smith as she talks to Gwenn Smith, editor of this year's volume, about current therapies such as drugs, electrical stimulation and cognitive therapies, and the future of neurotherapeuti
