http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (PhysOrg.com) -- Addiction disorders of various kinds are a major health and social problem, and our knowledge of how the brain`s reward system functions needs to be enhanced. Uppsala researchers now shows an unexpected effect of the signal substance glutamate on the midbrain in mice. The study is published in the Web edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, PNAS. http://www.physorg.com/news180207696.html Medicine & Health Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:00:19 EST news180207696 A recent comparison of proposed national alcohol policies in Lesotho, Malawi, Uganda, and Botswana shows that the drinks industry has assumed a significant and detrimental role in designing national alcohol policies in Sub-Saharan Africa. The policy drafts point to the alcohol industry's preferred version of a national alcohol policy, which includes letting the industry regulate its own marketing activities. http://www.physorg.com/news180087604.html Medicine & Health Tue, 15 Dec 2009 08:21:11 EST news180087604 When given the chance to consume alcohol at will, fruit flies behave in ways that look an awful lot like human alcoholism. That's according to a study published online on December 10th in Current Biology that is one of the first to consider alcohol self-administration in the insects. http://www.physorg.com/news179674844.html Biology Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:50:02 EST news179674844 Rats passively exposed to tobacco smoke become dependent on nicotine, according to a new study by Dr. Adrie Bruijnzeel and colleagues from the University of Florida in the US. Their findings of how rats' brains respond to exposure to tobacco smoke have implications for the study of the effects of tobacco smoke on the human brain even from passive exposure to other smokers, and for future studies testing new treatments for tobacco addiction. Their work has just been published online in Springer's journal Psychopharmacology. http://www.physorg.com/news179510992.html Medicine & Health Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:10:54 EST news179510992 Sarah Steele and Langtian "Ren" Yuan were both self-admittedly inexperienced Duke freshmen in the spring of 2006. But then they followed helpful directions of an assistant chemistry professor, added their own patience and ingenuity, and ended up identifying compounds that might allay the powerful cravings of methamphetamine and cocaine addiction. http://www.physorg.com/news179503070.html Chemistry Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:58:34 EST news179503070 Fruit flies may seem like unlikely heroes in the battle against drug abuse, but new research suggests that these insects - already used to study dozens of human disease - could claim that role. Scientists are reporting that fruit flies can be used as a simpler and more convenient animal model for studying the effects of cocaine and other drugs of abuse on the brain. Their study appears online in ACS Chemical Neuroscience, a new monthly journal. http://www.physorg.com/news179051952.html Medicine & Health Thu, 03 Dec 2009 08:39:43 EST news179051952 Smoking tobacco through a waterpipe exposes the user to the same toxicants - carbon monoxide and nicotine - as puffing on a cigarette, which could lead to nicotine addiction and heart disease, according to a study led by a Virginia Commonwealth University researcher published in the December issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. http://www.physorg.com/news178995752.html Medicine & Health Wed, 02 Dec 2009 17:03:10 EST news178995752 A new study from Perth's Telethon Institute for Child Health Research has found evidence that the amount and timing of alcohol consumption in pregnancy affects child behaviour in different ways. http://www.physorg.com/news178201526.html Medicine & Health Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:50:10 EST news178201526 Drug dependency is a recurrent but treatable kind of addiction. However, not all people who are drug dependent progress in the same way once they stop taking drugs. A new study shows that, in the case of cocaine, a high score on the so-called 'scale of craving', an antisocial personality type and previous heroin abuse are the factors most commonly involved in people falling back into the habit. http://www.physorg.com/news177857783.html Medicine & Health Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:58:56 EST news177857783 (PhysOrg.com) -- Enhancing the effects of the brain chemical dopamine influences how people make life choices by affecting expectations of pleasure, according to new research from the UCL Institute of Neurology. http://www.physorg.com/news177253940.html Medicine & Health Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:14:02 EST news177253940 The alcohol industry's sponsorship of sport should be banned and replaced with a dedicated alcohol tax modelled on those employed by some countries for tobacco, say scientists. http://www.physorg.com/news177019848.html Medicine & Health Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:11:13 EST news177019848 (PhysOrg.com) -- Exercise can help smokers quit because it makes cigarettes less attractive. A new study from the University of Exeter shows for the first time that exercise can lessen the power of cigarettes and smoking-related images to grab the attention of smokers. The study is published in the journal Addiction. http://www.physorg.com/news175787829.html Medicine & Health Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:20:01 EST news175787829 The Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy (CSTE) at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) announced today that a deceased former college football player who died at age 42 was already suffering from the degenerative brain disease, Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). This is the first time an advanced case of CTE has been discovered in a college football player that did not play professionally. It is also the first case diagnosed in a wide receiver. CTE has been diagnosed post-mortem in at least seven recently deceased former National Football League players, and early signs of the disease were recently found by CSTE researchers in an 18 year-old deceased football player. http://www.physorg.com/news175425734.html Medicine & Health Thu, 22 Oct 2009 10:50:03 EST news175425734 Last year the UK government reclassified cannabis from a class C to a class B drug, partly out of concerns that cannabis, especially the more potent varieties, may increase the risk of schizophrenia in young people. But the evidence for the relationship between cannabis and schizophrenia or psychosis remains controversial. A new study has determined that it may be necessary to stop thousands of cannabis users in order to prevent a single case of schizophrenia. http://www.physorg.com/news175425054.html Medicine & Health Thu, 22 Oct 2009 10:11:58 EST news175425054 New research using animal models is enabling a deeper understanding of the neurobiology of compulsive drug addiction in humans - knowledge that may lead to more effective treatment options to weaken the powerful cravings that cause people to relapse. The findings were released today at Neuroscience 2009, the Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting. http://www.physorg.com/news175337973.html Medicine & Health Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:20:01 EST news175337973 The good, the bad and the ugly: That's a quick summary of the effects of dopamine, a natural brain chemical that's linked to pleasure, addiction and disease. http://www.physorg.com/news174154939.html Medicine & Health Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:22:41 EST news174154939 Adolescents with psychiatric symptoms such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), social phobia, hostility and depression may be more likely to develop an Internet addiction, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. http://www.physorg.com/news173987521.html Medicine & Health Mon, 05 Oct 2009 19:30:01 EST news173987521 (PhysOrg.com) -- Immunization with an experimental anti-cocaine vaccine resulted in a substantial reduction in cocaine use in 38 percent of vaccinated patients in a clinical trial supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), a component of the National Institutes of Health. The study, published in the October issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, is the first successful, placebo-controlled demonstration of a vaccine against an illicit drug of abuse. http://www.physorg.com/news173978776.html Medicine & Health Mon, 05 Oct 2009 16:26:51 EST news173978776 (AP) -- About half of heroin and crack cocaine addicts in England's treatment programs quit the drugs after six months, a new study says. http://www.physorg.com/news173644638.html Medicine & Health Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:38:09 EST news173644638 About 2 million Americans currently use cocaine for its temporary side-effects of euphoria, which have contributed to making it one of the most dangerous and addictive drugs in the country. Cocaine addiction, which can cause severe biological and behavioral problems, is very difficult to overcome. Now, University of Missouri researchers Ashwin Mohan and Sandeep Pendyam, doctoral students in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, are utilizing computational models to study how the brain's chemicals and synaptic mechanisms, or connections between neurons, react to cocaine addiction and what this could mean for future therapies. http://www.physorg.com/news172853967.html Medicine & Health Tue, 22 Sep 2009 16:14:18 EST news172853967 (PhysOrg.com) -- A drug in development to treat cancer could help prevent relapse behavior in people trying to overcome an addiction to cocaine, according to a new study by UC Irvine neuroscientists. http://www.physorg.com/news172852380.html Medicine & Health Tue, 22 Sep 2009 15:50:01 EST news172852380 (PhysOrg.com) -- Excessive drinking or smoking by a husband or wife can strain a marriage. However, is it substance use specifically that causes problems within a relationship, or is it the difference in the amount of drinking and smoking between a husband and wife that loosens the ties that bind? http://www.physorg.com/news172339089.html Medicine & Health Wed, 16 Sep 2009 17:10:01 EST news172339089 New research with mice has provided some fascinating insight into how addictive drugs hijack reward signals and influence neural processes associated with learning and memory. The research, published by Cell Press in the September 10th issue of the journal Neuron, helps to explain why and how drug-associated memories, such as the place of drug use, drive and perpetuate the addiction. http://www.physorg.com/news171723185.html Medicine & Health Wed, 09 Sep 2009 14:20:02 EST news171723185 Almost a quarter of a million individuals addicted to heroin are incarcerated in the United States each year. However, many prison systems across the country still do not offer medical treatment for heroin and opiate addiction, despite the demonstrated social, medical and economic benefits of opiate replacement therapy (ORT). http://www.physorg.com/news171627159.html Medicine & Health Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:40:01 EST news171627159 Consumption of contraband cigarettes amongst adolescent daily smokers in Canada accounts for 17% of all cigarettes smoked by this age group, and rises to more than 25% in Ontario and Quebec. This behaviour may be undermining tobacco-prevention strategies, as they focus on taxation and minimum age restrictions to curb and prevent smoking, states an article in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). http://www.physorg.com/news171605926.html Medicine & Health Tue, 08 Sep 2009 05:19:23 EST news171605926 (AP) -- Ben Alexander spent nearly every waking minute playing the video game "World of Warcraft." As a result, he flunked out of the University of Iowa. http://www.physorg.com/news171210068.html Technology Thu, 03 Sep 2009 15:21:36 EST news171210068 The first US retreat for Internet addicts has opened its doors, welcoming a teenager that was captive to World of Warcraft online role-playing videogame. http://www.physorg.com/news170065097.html Technology Fri, 21 Aug 2009 10:10:01 EST news170065097 (AP) -- China is investigating the death of a teenager who was allegedly beaten to death in a camp designed to treat Internet addiction, state media said. http://www.physorg.com/news168777628.html Technology Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:10:04 EST news168777628 Whether it's highlighted in major news headlines about Argentinean affairs and Ponzi schemes, or in personal battles with obesity and drug addiction, individuals regularly succumb to greed, lust and self-destructive behaviors. New research from the Kellogg School of Management examines why this is the case, and demonstrates that individuals believe they have more restraint than they actually possess--ultimately leading to poor decision-making. http://www.physorg.com/news168523630.html Medicine & Health Mon, 03 Aug 2009 13:07:45 EST news168523630 A team of researchers has mapped patterns of illicit drug use across the state of Oregon using a method of sampling municipal wastewater before it is treated. http://www.physorg.com/news166893381.html Chemistry Wed, 15 Jul 2009 16:28:19 EST news166893381