Site For Alcohol's Action In The Brain Discovered

[Adsos Letter]

Source: Science Daily

(June 29, 2009) — Alcohol's inebriating effects are familiar to everyone. But the molecular details of alcohol's impact on brain activity remain a mystery. A new study by researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies brings us closer to understanding how alcohol alters the way brain cells work.

Their findings, published in the current advance online edition of Nature Neuroscience, reveal an alcohol trigger site located physically within an ion channel protein; their results could lead to the development of novel treatments for alcoholism, drug addiction, and epilepsy.

Ethanol, the alcohol in intoxicating beverages, is known to alter the communication between brain cells. "There's been a lot of interest in the field to find out how alcohol acts in the brain," says Paul A. Slesinger, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Peptide Biology Laboratory at the Salk Institute, who led the study. "One of several views held that ethanol works by interacting directly with ion channel proteins, but there were no studies that visualized the site of association."

Slesinger and his team now show that alcohols directly interact with a specific nook contained within a channel protein. This ion channel plays a key role in several brain functions associated with drugs of abuse and seizures

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090628171951.htm

[zbdent]

1. I thought there would be a link to a RW site ...

[MindPilot]

3. Not with the word "brain" in the subject line

and "alcohol" is spelled correctly.

[zbdent]

5. Not as a source for the scientists studying the effects ...

it would be a site which would show a prime example of the effects ...

[MindPilot]

2. It makes me wonder about how such an interaction might have evolved

or if it was just a happy coincidence, because humans are not the only animals that will seek out fermented materials to ingest.

[Fumesucker]

4. Umm.. Alcoholism *is* drug addiction..

I'm weary unto reverse peristalsis of the phrase "alcohol and drugs", to see it enshrined in a scientific paper really makes me want to :puke:.

[DaveinJapan]

7. Excellent point...

but I'm sure you can find plenty of scientists out there who would refer to all of these bad habits as "a disease", which is just as ridiculous imho.

[Fumesucker]

8. "Disease" has a number of meanings..

Heart disease is very different than is say, ebola.

One has a fair degree of control over whether one gets heart disease, just as one has a fair degree of control over whether one gets addicted.

And like every disease I can think of there is a genetic component to addiction, some people are more vulnerable than are others.

[jazzjunkysue]

6. "Hey, Paul. Open another one. I think I'm getting close...."

Now, that's what I call RESEARCH! Where do I sign up?