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Thursday, November 12, 2009

Role of the GABAB receptor in alcohol-seeking and drinking behavior


The present paper summarizes experimental data demonstrating the reducing effect of direct agonists and positive allosteric modulators (PAMs) of the γ-aminobutyric acidB (GABAB) receptor on different alcohol-related behaviors.

Different lines of evidence indicate that direct agonists, including baclofen, effectively suppress acquisition and maintenance of alcohol drinking behavior, relapse-like drinking, and alcohol's reinforcing, rewarding, stimulating, and motivational properties in rats and mice.

More recently, the discovery of a positive allosteric modulatory binding site, together with the synthesis of in vivo effective ligands, opened a new avenue of research in GABAB pharmacology.

Accumulating lines of evidence suggest that PAMs retain baclofen's capcity to suppress alcohol consumption and alcohol's reinforcing and motivational properties in rats; these effects occur at doses far from those producing behavioral toxicity.

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