Effect Of Naloxone On Learning And Memory Of Chronic Ethanol Intake In Rats And The Research Of Their Neurological Mechanisms

Background and objective: Alcohol abusing and alcoholics pose the world-wide social and medical health problem. It has been shown that chronic ethanol intake(CEI) presents negative effects on cognitive processes and behavioral style among which learning and memory deficit is one of the most prolonged and serious health problems. Learning is the neural functions of acquiring information while memory is the process of message storage. There are many neurotransmitters such as opioid peptides, cholinergic neurotransmitter, catecholamines, NMDA, GABA, NO, substance P, vasopressin, calcitonin gene related peptide, neurotrophic factors and so on involved in processes of learning or memory. These neurotransmitters interact directly or indirectly to regulate learning and memory.There are three major groups of endogenous opioid peptides (endorphin, enkephalin and dynorphin) as neurotransmitters or neuromodulators in the central nervous system (CNS) respectively to react on its corresponding opioid receptor( μ,δand κ ) and to regulate a variety of brain functions. Mounting evidence suggest the opioid system also influence learning and memory processing delicately and complicatedly after the research of addiction and detoxicated treatment of opioid drugs for many years. There are a large body of animal experiments indicating that alteration of the endogenous opioid peptides' level in the CNS or administration of exogenous opioid has an effect on animals certain procedure of learning and memory. Ethanol exerts a wide range of behavioral effects through its interaction with several neurotransmitters in the CNS. It seems that the activity of the endogenous opiate system may be of particular significance for...