Monday, February 28, 2011; 9:08 PM
I'm slightly embarrassed to admit it, but I distinctly remember getting the chills the first time I heard that kicky anthem of 1980s bubblegum pop, "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," by Wham. I then begged my mother to buy me the record, which I must have played about a million times before moving on to the likes of Michael Jackson and Madonna, followed by the Grateful Dead and Phish, then U2 and the Dave Matthews Band and, most lately, the Avett Brothers and Mumford and Sons.
With my ever-evolving taste in tunes, there's been one constant: Music has always had the power to make me blissfully happy. So it didn't necessarily come as a surprise when I read that researchers have now proved that listening to your favorite melodies and harmonies can trigger the brain to release large amounts of dopamine, a chemical that sends "feel good" signals to the rest of the body and plays a role in both motivation and addiction.
The small study, published last month in Nature Neuroscience, used brain scans to show that college students released significantly more dopamine when they heard their preferred music (which ranged from Beethoven to Led Zeppelin to the Israeli trance band Infected Mushroom) as opposed to someone else's tunes.
"It's interesting, because music is an abstract sequence of tones - you're not really getting anything for it - but somehow the way the brain is interpreting these tones, you get this intense physiological response, and the most potent reinforcing chemical in the brain is released, creating a wanting, a desire, a craving, and saying, 'Do this again,' " says the study's lead author, Valorie Salimpoor, a neuroscientist at the Montreal Neurological Institute in Canada.
She points out that not only was the potent neurochemical released at the moment of peak emotional response - when you might feel the aforementioned chills, for example, or your hair standing on end - but the mere anticipation of that peak arousal was also enough to cause an increase in dopamine.
"We didn't expect to see this," she says, "but what it means is that when people are following along with these sequences of tones, there seems to be a developing sense of anticipation or expectations that in itself is creating some sort of craving and a need to hear the next note, and that's what leading up to this intense pleasure."
National Institute on Drug Abuse
For Release January 18, 2011
Time-lapse technique can show cellular changes related to problems like addiction and brain tumors
Changes within deep regions of the brain can now be visualized at the cellular level, based on research on mice, which was funded by the National Institutes of Health. Published Sunday in Nature Medicine, the study used a groundbreaking technique to explore cellular-level changes over a period of weeks within deep brain regions, providing a level of detail not possible with previously available methods. The study was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the National Cancer Institute, and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
Researchers at Stanford University used time-lapse fluorescence microendoscopy, a technique that uses miniature probes to directly visualize specific cells over a period of time, to explore structural changes that occur in neurons as a result of tumor formation and increased stimulation in the mouse brain. This could lead to greater information on how the brain adapts to changing situations, including repeated drug exposure.
"Continued drug use leads to changes in neuronal circuits that are evident well after a person stops taking an addictive substance," said Dr. Nora D. Volkow, director of NIDA. "This study demonstrates an innovative technique that allows for a glimpse of these cellular changes within the brain regions implicated in drug reward, providing an important tool in our understanding and treatment of addiction."
Investigators focused on two brain regions within the study, the hippocampus and striatum. The striatum, a brain region important for motor function and habit formation, is also a major target for abused drugs. Some researchers believe that a shift in activity within the striatum is at least partly responsible for the progression from voluntary drug-taking to addiction. This new technique could allow a better understanding of how these processes occur at the cellular level, leading to insights into mechanisms underlying addictive behaviors.
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New York Times
The Opinion Pages
By DAVID BORNSTEIN
December 20, 2011
This is a story about a plan to end chronic homelessness in the United States. It’s not an indeterminate “war on homelessness,” but a methodical approach to do away with a major social problem. Each day, roughly 700,000 people in the country are homeless. About 120,000 are chronically homeless. They often live on the streets for years and have mental disabilities, addiction problems and life-threatening diseases like heart disease, cancer and diabetes. They are also five times more likely than ordinary Americans to have suffered a traumatic brain injury, which may have precipitated their homelessness. Without direct assistance, many will remain homeless for the rest of their lives — at enormous cost to society and themselves.
Against this backdrop, the 100,000 Homes Campaign has set the goal of placing 100,000 chronically homeless people — pinpointing those who face the greatest risk of dying on the streets — into permanent supportive housing by July 2013. It’s the human welfare equivalent of NASA’s race to put a man on the moon. Whether the goal is achieved or not, the campaign is shifting the way cities address a problem that has often been seen as more of a nuisance than a public health emergency.
The campaign was launched this past July by a New York-based organization called Common Ground and close to 20 organizations that focus on homelessness, veterans’ affairs, mental illness, housing and health care. So far 64 communities have come on board. As of today, 6,816 people have been housed — on track to hit 98,000 by the deadline. But organizers say they are gaining momentum.
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New York- Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center/Weill Cornell Medical College
NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell paper reports that restoring a crucial gene in a tiny area of the brain reverses depression-like behavior in mice; human data back up the promise of such therapy
NEW YORK (Oct. 20, 2010) -- In a report published in the Oct. 20 issue of Science Translational Medicine, researchers at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center say animal and human data suggest gene therapy to the brain may be able to treat patients with major depression who do not respond to traditional drug treatment.
The researchers hope to rapidly translate their findings into a human clinical trial using the same kind of gene therapy modality the investigators have pioneered to treat Parkinson's disease. A 45-patient randomized blinded phase II multicenter clinical trial using the gene therapy to treat Parkinson's has recently ended and results are being readied for publication.
"Given our findings, we potentially have a novel therapy to target what we now believe is one root cause of human depression," says the study's senior investigator, Dr. Michael Kaplitt, associate professor and vice chairman for research of neurological surgery at Weill Cornell Medical College and a neurosurgeon at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
"Current therapies for depression treat symptoms but not underlying causes, and while that works for many patients, those with advanced depression, or depression that does not respond to medication, could hopefully benefit from our new approach," adds Dr. Kaplitt.
The Science Translational Medicine study demonstrates that a brain protein known as p11 in a single, small brain area, the nucleus accumbens, is critical to the feelings of reward and pleasure that are often missing in depression. This brain region had primarily been studied in addiction research, but the inability to find satisfaction with positive life experiences is one of the major sources of disability in depression.
While investigators believe that depression is a complex disorder that likely involves a number of brain areas and neural circuits, they say their findings suggest that restoring p11 may significantly alter the course of depression in humans.
"Applying molecular neurobiology and gene therapy to depression could dramatically alter the approach to psychiatric diseases," Dr. Kaplitt says. "Our results provide further evidence that the underlying causes of psychiatric disorders are due to molecular changes in key brain circuits, so that they are much more similar to common neurological disorders -- such as Parkinson's disease -- that might be helped by restoring molecular function."
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BBC News
By Michelle Roberts Health reporter
September 21, 2010
Experts are warning that dementia is the greatest health and social crisis of the century as its global financial burden continues to escalate.
The World Alzheimer Report says dementia costs will amount to more than 1% of the world's gross domestic product this year at $604bn (£388bn).
To put this massive sum into context, if dementia were a country it would be the world's 18th largest economy.
But where exactly does this colossal cost come from?
The lion's share - about 70% of the costs - occur in Western Europe and North America.
This is partly because these countries boast a higher life expectancy, meaning increasingly more people are living into their 70s, 80s and 90s.
As people live longer, inevitably rates of this age-related illness will go up and there will be more people with dementia needing care.
But the World Alzheimer Report found nearly two-thirds of people with dementia now live in low and middle income countries - not in the richer ones.
So, much of the cost must boil down to societal differences in how we deal with dementia.
This is borne out by the figures.
In richer nations dementia costs about $32,865 (£21,000) per person, compared to just $868 (£550) in low income countries.
In the UK, for example, experts estimate that every dementia patient costs the economy £27,647 each year.
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NIH News
Monday, August 2, 2010
Antonello Bonci, M.D., one of the world's leading researchers in neuropsychopharmacology, has been appointed the Scientific Director of National Institute on Drug Abuse's (NIDA) Intramural Research Program (IRP) in Baltimore. NIDA is part of the National Institutes of Health.
Dr. Bonci is currently professor in residence in the Department of Neurology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), where he holds the Howard J. Weinberg Endowed Chair in Addiction Research. He is known for the elegance and multidisciplinary breadth of his studies on the long-term effects of drug exposure on the brain. Dr. Bonci and his colleagues were the first to demonstrate that drugs of abuse, such as cocaine, modify the strength of the connections between neurons. This finding cast a new light on the phenomenon of drug addiction, which could now be seen as a process of maladaptive learning. This new understanding, in turn, helped explain why drug taking can often become an automatic, compulsive behavior.
"We think Dr. Bonci will bring tremendous strength to our already robust intramural research portfolio," said NIDA Director Dr. Nora D. Volkow. "His impressive background as a superb neuroscientist with strong clinical training brings NIDA an exceptional investigator committed to translational science, and will bring us closer to new and better medicines for the treatment of addiction."
"I am thrilled to be a part of one of the world's most important scientific organizations looking at the challenging problem of drug abuse and addiction," said Dr. Bonci. "I especially look forward to working with Dr. Volkow and her colleagues in the extramural program, as well as the many top level investigators at the NIDA Intramural Research Center who have been responsible for many advances in addiction science. I hope that the experience I bring as a neurologist and a translational neuroscientist will help their already impressive scientific program thrive even further."
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The Huffington Post
Dr. Ali Binazir
June 15, 2010
Decision Enhancement Engineer, Author, Hypnotherapist, Thorn in the Side of Tyranny
I went to a talk a couple of weeks ago by a psychologist who said that battered wives go back to the abusing husband on average 7 times, even when social services has already intervened and set everything up for her to leave for good.
Seven times. To someone who is guaranteed to beat you up. Does that make any sense?
You know what else doesn't make sense? BDSM dungeons, where people pay good money to get abused by some latex-clad lady.
Here's a rubric I made for making sense of seemingly bizarre human behavior. If I saw it pop up over and over again -- say, millions of people doing it over the course of decades and centuries -- chances are that those people weren't totally nuts or stupid. There must be some deep biological phenomenon at work here.
You probably know folks who are stuck in terrible relationships, or who keep on having the same bad relationship with differently-named people. Heck, you may even be that person who engages in the serial self-flagellation. You also know people who systematically sabotage their own happiness: by being habitually late; by engaging in self-pity; by putting themselves down.
Turns out there's a dark reason to all of this. Many people unconsciously want to be treated poorly, taken advantage of, or even outright abused. They are seeking to experience self-pity, pain and denigration.
In this case, the biological phenomenon is simple: pain and negative emotions activate the reward centers of the brain, causing unconscious addiction to those negative emotions.
Let me say that again, because it was really, really important:
Pain and negative emotions activate the reward centers of the brain, causing unconscious addiction to those negative emotions.
Ladies and gentlemen -- this is a whopper. People think of the reward centers of the brain as the "pleasure centers," so it makes sense to them when someone gets addicted to cocaine, or crack, or sex. Because cocaine makes your brain light up, makes you high, and then you want more. Duh.
That's the addiction that people know. But you don't need cocaine or meth or crack to create a self-reinforcing addictive circuit in the brain. Anything that activates the beta-endorphin or dopamine pathways will do.
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Crossing the Bar
Understanding that Addictions are a Treatable Brain Disease
11.23.09
By Dr. Judith Ann Miller PhD, CEO Courage to Change Ranches
Printed in the January Issue of Journeys Magazine
Over the last two decades, our understanding of alcoholism and addiction has expanded exponentially. That understanding has been largely influenced not by the humanities, but by science – both pure and applied. Research in the fields of neurology, genetics, psychiatry, pharmacology, and nutrition – and the emergence of neuro-imaging, which can capture the actual workings of the brain – have all converged to provide new data on the relationship between thought and behavior. Its implications for the treatment of addiction are profound. Addiction is no longer perceived as a moral problem; it is now recognized as a brain disease that can be managed and treated.
It was in fact, a (European-trained) clinical nutritionist, Dr. Charles Lieber, who upset scientific dogma by proving in 1974 that alcohol was toxic. Until then cirrhosis of the liver had been attributed to malnutrition. Lieber also conducted the underlying research that led to identifying bacteria as the cause of stomach ulcers, discovered the toxic interaction between alcohol and Tylenol, and with the legendary Marty Mann established the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. From that point on the field of nutrition came to the forefront paralleled with cutting edge science in developing methods of recovery instead of just treating the symptoms alcoholism and addiction.
In general, once nutrients are ingested and broken down by the digestive system, they contribute to the overall functioning of the body. Some are used in the manufacture of hormones. And some, especially
proteins, are broken down into their constituent amino acids that build and maintain cells. These amino acids are the building blocks of the neurons of the brain.
In order to function at its optimum, the brain’ s neurochemistry utilizes naturally occurring substances; enzymes co-factors, fatty acids, amino acids, peptides, vitamins, and proteins to create a wide array of organic acids, neurotransmitters, hormones, other brain chemistry markers that determine the quality of mental and physical health. Once the brain/mind and body is satiated with the nutrients that it requires for survival, its response to addictive substances is greatly decreased.
Science has proven that certain amino acids deficiencies are the basis for addictive tendencies. Correcting those deficiencies provides neurotransmitter rebalancing and an opportunity for the systems of the body to function once again in homeostasis.
Amino acid therapy has been trialed since the 1950s, but the capability to work at the molecular level, which boosted so many of the sciences, has permitted nutritional researchers to identify deficiencies and target treatment as never before. Amino acid therapy provides actual physiological repair of the brain, as opposed to the masking that synthetic pharmacological medications accord.
Laboratory testing can determine exactly which amino acids are deficient, and dictate remediation. Further, precise dosages, in combination with interacting vitamins and minerals, can be compounded for specific individuals. Likewise through laboratory testing, progress in repairing the neurons and restoring healthy neurotransmissions can be monitored and is often measurable in weeks. This pioneering approach is slowly reaching mainstream addiction rehabilitation centers. But in the meantime, the clinics which have been trialing amino acid therapy over the last decade boast 5-year recovery maintenance rates as high as 80%, compared to the overall nationwide rate of 12%.
What AA intuited 7 decades ago; that alcoholism is a physiological disease, that it is chronic and incurable, is now scientifically verified, and furthermore, entrenched in the national bureaucracy.
However, the government’s attempts to deal with the mounting crisis of drug use and abuse, in the meantime, were stalled. The major institution charged with public policy, the National Institute on Drug
Abuse (NIDA), was facing the wall of stigma attached to the disease, and the grandstanding of politicians who exploited this stigma by progressively criminalizing addiction.
In a brilliant move, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, the director of NIDA‘s umbrella, the National Institute of Health (NIH), snagged Dr. Nora Volkow for the position of director of NIDA. It may be one of the few instances where a hardcore researcher was projected into such a powerful political position. After Volkow assumed leadership of NIDA in 2003, everything changed.
A perusal of the current literature from NIDA drives home the message: Addiction is a chronic disease characterized by observable physiological changes…and it is a disease that can be treated. Volkow‘s vision, however, does not stop with science. The evidence is invariably followed by a Volkow-style argument for substantiating the science with therapy and community-based support; the treatment of the person as a whole and as a part of society.
Volkow brings all this together at the level of national policy. More than one U.S. congressperson has been swayed by her plea to join the interests of public safety and public health. More than one judge has held hard evidence in hand to warrant orders for treatment from the bench.
Americans like to think that the road to social sanity is paved with good intentions, but indeed it may also be paved with the cobblestones of hard and irrefutable science that will allow the addict to finally walk down the road of recovery.
Excerpted from Crossing the Bar, a report on scientific issues relating to alcoholism and addiction by Judith Ann Miller, PhD, CEO Courage to Change Ranches, Colorado 719-541-4912
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