Visualizing Neural Pathways Affected by Alcohol in Animals

Alcohol has many short- and long-term effects on functional units of nerve cells, or neural pathways, in the brain. Imaging studies in laboratory animals, particularly studies using autoradiographic detection methods, allow researchers to analyze the activities of these pathways as well as alcohol's effects on them. Commonly used techniques measure blood flow, glucose utilization, protein synthesis, and the activity of the enzyme cytochrome oxidase throughout the animal's brain. Using these approaches, researchers have investigated alcohol's effects both in animals that receive alcohol for the first time and in animals with a history of alcohol exposure. These studies demonstrate that different alcohol doses affect different neural pathways and that the affected brain areas also vary depending on the time that has elapsed since alcohol ingestion. Moreover, chronic alcohol use can markedly alter the baseline activity of certain neural pathways, even in animals that are not alcohol dependent.