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Ultimately the authors of the study, released online today in the journal  Nature Medicine , envision their work could lead to new non-addictive , nicotine-based treatments for some of the 51 million people worldwide who suffer from the disease. "Our study provides compelling biological evidence that a specific genetic variant contributes to risk for schizophrenia, defines the mechanism responsible for the effect and validates that nicotine improves that deficit," said Jerry Stitzel, a researcher at the Institute for Behavioral Genetics (IBG) and one of four CU Boulder researchers on the study. Led by Uwe Maskos -- a researcher at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France -- the study found that when mice with schizophrenic characteristics were given nicotine daily, their sluggish brain activity increased within two days. Within one week it had normalized. "Basically the nicotine is compensating for a genetically determined impairment," says Stitzel. "No on...

Dr. Sven Kroener of the College of Texas at Dallas is researching vagus nerve stimulation as a method to scale back drug cravings. Credit score: College of Texas at Dallas A brand new preclinical examine led by a College of Texas at Dallas researcher reveals that vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) remedy might need the potential to assist individuals overcome drug habit by serving to them be taught new behaviors to interchange these related to looking for medicine. The brand new analysis, revealed within the January challenge of the journal  Studying and Reminiscence , discovered that drug cravings in addicted rats have been decreased once they have been handled with VNS. It is potential that the analysis might be utilized to individuals who have been hooked on medicine, mentioned senior creator Dr. Sven Kroener, assistant professor within the College of Behavioral and Mind Sciences. "We're learning extinction studying and the way vagus ne...

Adolescents who smoke pot as early as 14 do worse by 20 on some cognitive tests and drop out of school at a higher rate than non-smokers, confirms the study, published Dec. 29 in  Development and Psychopathology , a Cambridge University Press journal. "Overall, these results suggest that, in addition to academic failure , fundamental life skills necessary for problem-solving and daily adaptation [...] may be affected by early cannabis exposure," the study says. However, the cognitive declines associated with cannabis do not seem to be global or widespread, cautioned the study's lead author, Natalie Castellanos-Ryan, an assistant professor at UdeM's School of Psychoeducation. Her study found links between cannabis use and brain impairment only in the areas of verbal IQ and specific cognitive abilities related to frontal parts of the brain, particularly those that require learning by trial-and-error. In addition, if teenagers hold off until age 17 before smoki...

Researchers analyzed data from the 2012-2013 U.S. National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions III, the fourth national survey conducted by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The researchers estimated the odds of AUD among adults with and without PTSD by race. Of the 19,705 participants, 511 (301 women, 210 men) were AI/AN and 19,194 (10,639 women, 8,555 men) were NHW. The investigators found that both PTSD and AUD were more common among AI/ANs than NHWs. Although PTSD was significantly associated with AUD in both populations, the association was significantly more prevalent among AI/ANs. Thus, among men the rate of both PTSD and AUD in AI/ANs was more than three times that of NHW men (9.5% vs. 3.1%). The authors suggested that screening and interventions for PTSD in tribal-government programs and in AI/AN health services could help to reduce the greater risk for AUD in AI/ANs. They also called for studies that measure trauma resulting f...