Scripps project identifies new targets to fight addiction

A Scripps effort aimed at better understanding the brain chemistry involved in addiction has uncovered neurons that play a dual role in two key brain systems involved in producing a drug high as well as stress from withdrawal. Drugs that target those neurons, they say, could help with both eliminating the brain's reward process for taking a drug as well as the panic involved in withdrawal. "If we can find a way to target those neurons in humans, maybe we can reduce the 'high' produced by the drug and reduce the withdrawal symptoms," said Olivier George, assistant professor at TSRI and senior author of the new study. Release