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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

alcohol addiction, acute ethanol, infiltration of macrophages, blood-brain barrier

College

Family, Home, and Social Sciences

Department

Psychology

Abstract

Alcohol addiction affects the lives of millions of people worldwide. In the US alone, an estimated 28 million are currently undergoing treatment to recover from the effects of alcohol abuse at the cost of over 249 billion dollars. The disease has dire consequences for those affected, as well as their families and communities. Despite this, the mechanism of alcohol addiction formation remains a question. One prominent theory relies on the mesolimbic circuitry of the brain, commonly referred to as the reward circuit. This region is made up of two key brain regions, the Nucleus Accumbens (NAc) and the Ventral Tegmental Area (VTA). In a basic model, dopamine releasing neurons project from the VTA into the NAc, where dopamine release is correlated with pleasure. During addiction, this dopamine release gets dysregulated, resulting in addiction symptoms. Current research shows that one key, understudied regulator of dopamine release are microglia cells. Part of the brains resident immune system, these small cells are commonly activated by a variety of diseases. Once active, they release proteins that modulate many areas of the brain, including dopamine release in the NAc. Beyond activating microglia, some dopamine related diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s, and stimulant addiction trigger an influx of peripheral immune cells that affect disease response. Often referred to as infiltration, this uncommon breach of the blood brain barrier links the peripheral and central immune systems, which may illuminate some of the missing steps in alcohol addiction formation. The purpose of the current study was to determine whether the formation of alcohol addiction involves infiltration.

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