Neural Mechanisms Underlying Nicotine and Alcohol Combinations
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2015-12-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Nicotine and alcohol are frequently used together and their combined use contributes to more
than half a million deaths each year, with more alcoholics dying from smoking-related
diseases than from alcohol-related diseases. Using a new multi-modal MRI approach combined
with data fusion, the investigators propose to study how nicotine modulates alcohol-induced
changes in the function of brain circuits. The investigators hypotheses are:
- functional connectivity (FC) in the reward network, containing components of the
mesolimbic dopamine system, will be altered by alcohol, and additional increases in FC
will be observed if nicotine is also present (e.g., additive effects).
- co-administration of nicotine will counteract the effects of alcohol on FC in multiple
brain networks, including visual, sensorimotor and motor brain circuits, that may be
associated with the impairing effects of alcohol