AP42238

Cocaine Cocaine is a stimulant that suppresses appetite, increases energy and euphoric sense of happiness. It alters the reward pathway in the brain to change animal's responses to the drug, cocaine. It has been shown to encourage other drug use. Scientists found significant increases in the density of dendritic spines(structures that bear the synapses required for signaling) the frontal cortex within two hours of administering cocaine to the mice. The frontal cortex controls our long-term planning, as well as decision-making and other behaviors that involve discipline capabilities and high level reasoning. Dendritic spines are key transport messages for pass from one nerve cell to another and also store neural information.(Wilbrecht). The team says their findings may help propel research into human addiction by aiding research to identify what is going awry in the frontal cortexes of drug-addicted humans, and by explaining how drug-related stimulantsdominate the brain's decision-making processes(Wilbrecht).

References:

Mount Sinai Medical Center. "Subtle changes may occur in neural circuits due to cocaine addiction." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 12 May 2014. . Nordqvist, Christian. "Cocaine physically changes brain to seek more." // Medical News Today //. MediLexicon, Intl., 26 Aug. 2013. Web. 2 Aug. 2014. 

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