Prozac, Ritalin, Cognitive Enhancement, and the power of a snappy title

Let it be known that Sci, like many a young, bright-eyed little scientist, tries to keep up on her reading. TRIES is the operative word, but every week Sci gets the Tables of Contents for all the major journals in her field (and all the major ones in her subdisciple) emailed straight to her for [...]

Cheesecake-eating rats and food addiction, a commentary

As you might have noticed, Sci is really interested lately in the concept of food reward systems, in particular the issues associated with the effects of binge eating on reward systems in the brain, and the issue of “food addiction”. And Sci is not the only one who is interested. Lots of other people in [...]

Dopamine and Obesity: The D2 Receptor

Sci would like to note that today’s entry is being written on the adorably tiny screen of her netbook, which is named Ruby. Everyone say hi to Ruby! Unfortunately, this is because her wireless on her normal computer suddenly decided that it was too good for her modem. Perhaps it’s an April Fool’s Day joke. [...]

Dopamine and Obesity: The Food Addiction?

Sci picked this paper today partially because it was handed to her on a platter by the fantastic Dr. Pal, and partially because today she is SO HUNGRY. She’s had a TON of food already today, and is still entirely ravenous. Maybe it was looking at this paper too long. (Cereal break) Anyway. As I’m [...]

Opponent-Process Theory: Welcome to the dark side

Sci continues her discussion of opponent-process theory in this second installment, with many thanks to Koob and his co-author, Le Moal.

Things I like to Blog About: Addiction and the Opponent Process Theory

So what is the opponent-process theory? The opponent-process theory (hereafter called the OP Theory) is one of the current theories we are using to understand addiction. Because, to be honest, we don’t really understand it.

The Tussin, The Tussin

Notorious was having a little conversation with some friends, and someone asked a strange question: why would one want to abuse over-the-counter (OTC) medications such as Robitussin? OTC cold medication abuse is pretty common and the subject of considerable comment in pop culture — not the least of which are a great song by MC [...]

“Look at me on the lily?! Is that not, is that not so weird?”

Awesome blog friend JLK just sent me this link. I can’t be more amused. The life of a bee on cocaine. Does it get any better? And Ed (yes, you, ED) has beaten me to the Friday Weird Science! He’s got an awesome article on the traumatic insemination practices of spiders. Ya’ll probably read him [...]

Giving drugs to humans, the whys and wherefores

We do lots of animal studies with addictive drugs, why do we need to be giving it to humans?

Is Modafinil the Next Cocaine? Probably Not

A couple of contradictory self-administration studies and some studies on dopamine effects in the brain, in this case, just isn’t enough to prove the drug “addictive”. And is modafinil the next cocaine? Probably not.