The interplay between ventro striatal BDNF levels and the effects of valproic acid on the acquisition of ethanol-induced conditioned place preference in mice

Publication date: 1 November 2017 Source:Neuroscience Letters, Volume 660 Author(s): Manuel Alves dos Santos, Sarah Sousa Escudeiro, Germana Silva Vasconcelos, Natália Castelo Branco Matos, Marcos Romário Matos de Souza, Manoel Cláudio Azevedo Patrocínio, Leonardo Pimentel Dantas, Danielle Macêdo, Silvânia Maria Mendes Vasconcelos Alcohol addiction is a chronic, relapsing and progressive brain disease with serious consequences for health. Compulsive use of alcohol is associated with the capacity to change brain structures involved with the reward pathway, such as ventral striatum. Recent evidence suggests a role of chromatin remodeling in the pathophysiology of alcohol dependence and addictive-like behaviors. In addition, neuroadaptive changes mediated by the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) seems to be an interesting pharmacological target for alcoholism treatment. In the present study, we evaluated the effects of the deacetylase inhibitor valproic acid (VPA) (300mg/kg) on the conditioned rewarding effects of ethanol using conditioned place preference (CPP) (15% v/v; 2g/kg). Ethanol rewarding effect was investigated using a biased protocol of CPP. BDNF levels were measured in the ventral striatum. Ethanol administration induced CPP. VPA pretreatment did not reduce ethanol-CPP acquisition. VPA pretreatment increased BDNF levels when compared to ethanol induced-CPP. VPA pretreatment increased BDNF levels even in saline conditioned mice. Taken together,...
Source: Neuroscience Letters - Category: Neuroscience Source Type: research