Gamer Jason Moll
Platform PS2
It's the first drink, the first hit, the first high that gets you.
Down and up the bloodstream it goes, straight to your liver, then your brain, where it f
esters and deadens everything, but you aren't aware that all this is happening. You feel
like you're floating, you're somewhere else, you're not here. In this heightened state, the
world's not so terrible, not so bleak after all.
Ask anyone who's done alcohol and drugs and you'll get the standard reply: "It's the first
high you keep wanting, which you aren't really able to reproduce again. So you keep doing
it, to hear that 'click' in your head but it's never quite like the first time."
But much more than just rushing after this euphoria, there are many reasons why some
people take comfort in drugs, so much so that their very lives become compromised. There's
depression, peer pressure, clinical illness, and a complex strata of other biological and sociological
factors that doctors and scientists have long been trying to understand.
Now add to that list Mpdz, an addiction-relevant quantitative trait gene. By itself, it doesn't
cause addiction per se, but it does influence drug dependence and withdrawal. It applies to a
specific class of drugs - sedative-hypnotics - which are commonly used for their euphoric and
sedative effects. These include alcohol, inhalants, barbiturates and benzodiazepines like Rohypnol
or "roofies" and other "club drugs."
What causes these substances to be so addictive in the first place? Gabe Romain of Betterhuman
explains that they "create dependence in people by hijacking their brain's natural reward circuitry."
Over time and repeated use, the body then builds up a deadly reliance on these drugs in order to
keep functioning normally, or their absence will trigger symptoms of withdrawal.
And withdrawal is never a pleasant experience. According to AddictionWithdrawal.com, withdrawal
symptoms vary from substance to substance, and even on the kind of addiction the user has (either
physical and/or psychological). When their poison of choice is taken away from them, alcoholics can
expect to feel an erratic, rapid pulse, increased hand tremors, vomiting, hallucinations and even
grand malseizures. During the same cathartic process, users doped up on ecstasy and meth will also
experience depression, anxiety, panic attacks and paranoid delusions. The list goes on, and generally,
it's not something most of us would voluntarily go through.
Hence, many addicts, in seeking to avoid or stop these withdrawal symptoms, perpetuate the vicious
cycle and continue using drugs.
This is where the new discovery of Mpdz's addictive influence comes into play. Scientists in OHSU
(Oregon Health State University) and the Portland Alcohol Research Center are responsible for this
scientific breakthrough. During their four-year search, they narrowed the initial field of more than
1,000 candidate genes to five, and finally, to one - Mpdz. They did this by using mice that were bred
to possess a region of the chromosome known to be associated with a predisposition to physical
dependence and withdrawal from sedative-hypnotics.
Says Kari Buck, Ph.D., associate professor of behavioral neuroscience and senior author of the study,
"now that we've identified one of the key genes, we can begin to study how this gene regulates brain
circuits involved in drug dependence and withdrawal."
Of the five candidate genes tested, it was the only one that had differences which altered amino acid
sequences. Also, its expression correlated with withdrawal severity in mice, which further proved that it
was indeed a drug withdrawal gene.
How does Mpdz influence addiction? Its protein interacts with serotonin receptors in the brain's nerve cells.
In previous scientific studies, serotonin receptors had been found to play integral roles in alcohol and drug
addiction, including some psychiatric disorders.
Naturally, the next step is to use this discovery to develop new pharmaceutical therapies for alcoholics and
drug addicts. OHSU scientists are hopeful that "for those people who are susceptible to drug withdrawal and
are being treated for drug abuse, therapies focused on this gene and/or the proteins it interacts with could
make sense."
When they've made the pill that can stop these terrible withdrawal symptoms, people seeking to staunch
their addictions will definitely have an easier time in rehab. But without the physical torture that they'll most
certainly have to endure without the pills, wouldn't that make their recovery less tenable? Recovered addicts will
tell you that part of the reason why they've quit their habits is because of the horror that is rehab. "I never
want to go through that again," they'll say, "the vomiting, the hallucinations, the seizures ? it was so awful."
Some will say that it's going through the experience of conquering themselves, of being able to rise above their
physical pain without artificial substances, but only through sheer strength and willpower, that contributes to
long-term recovery.
But who can predict what kind of advances medical technology will make in the future? All that matters is
that OHSU scientists have taken that important first step towards solving drug dependency. What comes next,
we await with bated breath.
