Researchers used high-resolution technologies to see how dopamine circuitry in mice is affected by addictive drugs. The results answered older structural questions, while raising new ones about plasticity and recovery in the brain.

A late 1980s commercial meant to combat drug addiction used a pair of frying eggs as a metaphor for the effects of drugs on the human brain. While researchers have long understood that there is a connection between drug abuse and adverse changes in the brain, it is only now that they can study, in fine detail, alterations that actually occur.

Using state-of-the-art technology, researchers from the University of Chicago and the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory detailed, for the first time, specific changes that occur in the brains of mice exposed to cocaine.

The research provides new insights into the function of key dopamine neuron structures, which are Involved in multiple functions, from voluntary movement to behavior. The results turned the page on older questions regarding how dopamine is transmitted, while opening a new chapter on others. Through continued work, the researchers hope to understand how certain types of addictions work and, perhaps, develop targeted treatments.

In a recent paper published in the journal eLife, the researchers describe how they are building on the burgeoning field of connectomics, the development of highly detailed and accurate 3D maps of every neuron in the brain and their connections.

For their part, the team set out to more clearly identify the process by which dopamine is transmitted across neurons, as they don’t make conventional physical connections, where signals are transferred across synapses.

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Materials provided by DOE/Argonne National Laboratory. Original written by John Spizzirri. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.