TECH Signal 118
Abstinence more than doubles BNST brain activity in mice before relapse, suggesting a future screening marker for relapse risk
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Mice that developed compulsive drinking after forced alcohol abstinence showed more than double the activity in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, a brain region linked to stress and addiction, and this signal appeared before they resumed drinking.
If similar BNST activity patterns are confirmed in humans, clinicians could eventually screen for relapse risk before someone drinks again, addressing a gap in alcohol use disorder treatment where prediction tools are largely absent. The finding also implies that abstinence itself may create brain changes that increase vulnerability to relapse, which complicates the abstinence-first treatment model that dominates current clinical practice.
Written by elseif from the cluster below · every claim links back to a sourceThe three things worth knowing
Mice given long-term voluntary alcohol access followed by forced abstinence developed aversion-resistant drinking, consuming bitter alcohol in larger quantities than mice that never experienced abstinence.
BNST activity in abstinent mice more than doubled compared to non-abstinent mice, and this signal appeared before alcohol was reintroduced.
A colleague is now investigating whether similar BNST activity patterns appear in humans with alcohol use disorder during early abstinence.
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