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A new study published in Nature by the University of North Carolina scientists is the first study to show that dopamine in the brain surges dramatically from the anticipation of receiving cocaine before the drug actually gets delivered to the brain.
Dopamine is known to peak during addictive behaviors like drug taking, eating and sex, but showing that there is an increase before the actual event could help understand why recovering drug addicts relapse. Clinicians working with addicts report that drug related cues and paraphernalia often result in intense carvings and this study can help lead the way to targeting therapies toward the prevention of craving and addictive behaviors
First molecular explanation of how the body metabolizes or detoxifies dangerous drugs
In a related study, other researchers, also from University of North Carolina report that they have found the enzyme that could bind to two cocaine molecules simultaneously and generate the primary metabolic breakdown product of cocaine. This is a significant finding in that this could not only lead to a treatment for drug overdose, but also provide a means of detoxifying chemical weapons such as sarin, soman, tabun and VX gases from the body.
This is the first crystal structure of the protein human carboxylesterase 1 (hCE1) an enzyme found in the liver, small intestine, kidneys, lungs, testes and scavenger cells and, to a lesser extent, in blood plasma. The researchers suggest that one way of treating those who have overdosed on cocaine would be to inject the enzyme into the victim before the drug became toxic.
The US military is very interested in this approach for use in a variety of civilian and military settings. Specific targeted treatments can be created by engineering a more active form of the enzyme that is specific for cocaine or sarin or other toxic drugs.
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