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Alcohol use disorder is a disorder characterized by an inability to stop or control one’s drinking despite adverse health, occupational or social consequences. Conventional treatments include medication, behavioral therapy, and support groups. Even with these treatments, however, many individuals find it hard to achieve lasting recovery, highlighting the need for more effective therapies.
Now, a new study has determined that psilocybin decreases the consumption of alcohol in rats by modifying certain pathways in the brain.
Psilocybin is a psychedelic compound that occurs naturally in some species of hallucinogenic mushrooms. For centuries now, it has been used in different spiritual and cultural contexts. In the last couple of years, research has determined that this psychedelic possesses therapeutic properties that may influence an individual’s cognition, perception and mood.
Early clinical trials have determined that psilocybin-assisted therapy may be effective in the treatment of a range of mental conditions, including anxiety, depression and substance-use disorders.
For this recent study, researchers used male Long-Evans rats, with the selection based on how well they could model human behaviors on alcohol consumption. During the study period, the rats had unlimited access to water and food, and were individually housed under a controlled dark/light cycle.
At first, the rats were given access to an ethanol solution for a four-week period. Once this time lapsed, they were trained to self-administer the ethanol in operant cages. This approach was used to mimic voluntary consumption of alcohol in humans and would allow investigators to measure their motivation to consume alcohol.
The investigators divided the study into several experiments to separate different variables, microinfusing psilocybin directly into the right or left nucleus accumbens in one experiment and injecting psilocybin directly into the body cavity in another. The nucleus accumbens is a region of the brain involved in reward processing.
The investigators determined that psilocybin brought on notable changes in gene expression in the nucleus accumbens. They also discovered that the psychedelic’s administration led to a significant reduction in self-administration of alcohol, noting that the rats which received the drug demonstrated a 51% decrease in total alcohol intake and a 48% drop in the number of lever presses. This suggests that the effects of psilocybin are strong and not limited to direct infusions to the brain.
In addition, the researchers observed that the psychedelic’s microinjection into the left nucleus accumbens led to a 39% drop in alcohol intake and a 38% reduction in lever presses. Further, the investigators observed that serotonin receptor pathways mediated the effects of psilocybin.
These findings suggest that psilocybin could be a useful treatment for decreasing alcohol consumption, working by reducing the rewarding properties of alcohol. However, more studies are required to confirm the drug’s effectiveness in humans.
The study’s findings were reported in the “Brain” journal.
Currently, there are plenty of startups, including atai Life Sciences N.V. (NASDAQ: ATAI), that are focusing on studying different medicinal applications of psychedelics, such as psilocybin. It is likely that diverse uses for these substances could be discovered and the field of medicine will be revolutionized.
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