Brain Imaging Functional Consequences of Ethanol in the Central Nervous System

Abstract

Abstract. In recent years, sophisticated methods have been developed to view structure and function within the living brain. Functional imaging methods are used to visualize dynamic chemical processes that are linked to brain activity. Increased neural activity, for example, leads to greater glucose and oxygen consumption and greater regional rates of blood flow to meet elevated energy demands. Mapping these changes provides quantitative visual descriptions of localized changes in brain activity that result from behavioral or pharmacological manipulations. This chapter first describes several current methods and how they are used to study the effects of alcohol on brain function. In the second part, the effects of acute intoxication are discussed with emphasis on the complex nature of alcohol's effects in the central nervous system, which depend on dose, time since administration, and environmental context. In the final part, the functional consequences of long-term exposure to alcohol as well as diseases associated with chronic alcoholism are reviewed.

Alcohol‐Naïve Alcohol‐Preferring (P) Rats Exhibit Higher Local Cerebral Glucose Utilization Than Alcohol‐Nonpreferring (NP) and Wistar Rats

“…2-DG imaging has been used in the alcohol research field to determine LCGU rates in nonselected rat lines immediately after alcohol administration or consumption, when ethanol is present in the CNS. Several studies have shown that the acute administration of alcohol produces anatomically distinct changes in rates of LCGU that are time, dose, and route of administration-dependent (Lyons et al, 1998;Porrino et al, 1998a,b;Porrino, 1994, 1997;Williams-Hemby et al, 1996).…”

Alcohol Attenuates Load‐related Activation During a Working Memory Task: Relation to Level of Response to Alcohol

“…Some investigators have found up to 23% reductions in cerebral glucose metabolism after alcohol (Volkow et al, 2005;Wang et al, 2000), whereas others reported much smaller changes (deWit et al, 1990) or even metabolic increases (Lyons et al, 1998). A moderate dose of alcohol increases blood flow in ventral striatum and in the ascending reticular activating system (Ingvar et al, 1998).…”