Just can't get enough
| 11 November, 2010 | Richard P. Grant |
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Professor David Nutt was famously sacked from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs by the UK’s Labour Government at the time, apparently for being rational about scientific evidence. He now chairs the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, and is head of the Department of Neuropsychopharmacology and Molecular Imaging, Imperial College London. He is also a Section Head of Substance Abuse in our Psychiatry Faculty.
His recent work in the Lancet discusses a rational approach to measuring drug harm, concluding that current UK policy is not based on considerations of harm—especially when alcohol is considered.
David was kind enough to talk to us about his current work on brain imaging of addiction. He is interested in understanding the molecular underpinnings common to all forms of addiction, particularly how drugs reinforce addictive behaviour—why alcohol and heroin addicts for example have trouble controlling their addiction. He also hopes be able to study gambling as an addiction, as this shares many behavioural aspects with drug addiction, but without drugs “contaminating the biological measures we make.”
I should perhaps point out that he’s talking about excellent PET facilities at Imperial; David’s work is looking at human subjects.
You can also follow David on Twitter!
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Dear Professor David NUTT,
What’s about endorphins, muscular exersice and addiction?
Best regards.
Jean COUDERT, Professor emeritus (University”d’AUVERGNE”, Clermont-Ferrand, France)
Enjoyed your video. I follow the research literature closely for new information on the common biocircuitry of addictive substances and behaviors.I will be interested in the results for the role of the Gaba 5 subtype receptor and the degree to which opioid receptors mediate addictive behavior in non-opioid addiction. I’ve been struck by the fact that many research approaches have targeted a “pathologic” susceptibility of receptor sensitivities or number. It would seem that from an evolutionary standpoint a gene set providing vulnerability to addiction might stem from a gene set that may, in fact, have adaptive advantage in a normal natural environment. Such a gene set may confer an increased responsiveness to rewarding elements in ones environment, and potentially greater enthusiasm in responding to and seeking rewards, perhaps even greater levels of determination and tenacity. This positive gene set may only result in “pathologic” behavior when it is exposed to nonnatural rewards (refined and synthetic drugs and artificial behavioral scenarios-gambling casinos, pornography) that were not present during the brains evolutionary configuration. Therefore the brain is relatively defenseless against these provocative rewards that stimulate it above natural thresholds and highjack its motivated behavior. Animals in nature do not appear to be vulnerable to any self-destructive addiction behavior. People in primitive cultures do not suffer form the the same degree of penetration of addiction into their societies. It appears to be a disorder perpetrated by man on man as he naively searches for more and more clever ways to produce higher levels of reward stimulation in his brain unaware of the collateral consequences. I make these comments only because I feel we should at least consider that we may be dealing with generally adaptive genes (in addiction-prone individuals) that offer susceptibility only in the context of unfortunate exposure to nonnatural hyper-activating stimuli in the reward system.