NEURAL SUBSTRATES OF CIGARETTE SMOKING AND RELATED BEHAVIORS

该子项目是利用NIH/NCRR资助的中心赠款提供的资源的许多研究子项目之一。子项目和研究者（PI）可能从另一个NIH来源获得主要资金，因此可以在其他CRISP条目中表示。所列机构为中心，不一定是研究者所在机构。功能性神经影像学研究指出，边缘系统和边缘系统结构的神经网络有助于对滥用药物（包括尼古丁）成瘾的行为过程。这个神经网络包括眶额皮质、前扣带回、岛皮质、杏仁核和纹状体（背侧纹状体和腹侧纹状体或纹状体核）。然而，在人类中，还没有研究表明，对人类神经网络不同组成部分的损害将如何影响对药物的渴望、给药的主观感觉和主动寻求药物。迄今为止，也没有任何人类研究询问这些成分中的哪些（如果有的话）对于维持药物成瘾是至关重要的。该提案将利用我们独特的爱荷华州大学神经病学患者登记处，开始解决尼古丁成瘾患者的一些重要问题。该项目将使我们了解暴露于香烟烟雾的环境改变冲动和相关主观和生理参数的大脑机制，这些参数可能会促进不受控制的使用和复发。这些过程将在病变受试者和神经系统完整的受试者中进行研究。

This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. Functional neuroimaging studies have pointed to a neural network of limbic and paralimbic structures that subserve the behavioral processes of addiction to drugs of abuse, including nicotine. This neural network includes the orbitofrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, insular cortices, the amygdala, and the striatum (dorsal striatum and ventral striatum or nucleus accumbens). However, no work in humans has addressed how damage to different components of this neural network in humans will impact the craving, subjective feeling of drug administration, and active seeking of drugs. Nor any of the human studies to date has asked which, if any, of these components is critically necessary for the maintenance of addiction to drugs. This proposal will take advantage of our unique University of Iowa Department of Neurology Patient Registry to begin addressing some of these important issues in patients addicted to nicotine. This project will allow us to understand the brain mechanisms by which environmental exposure to cigarette smoke alters urge and related subjective and physiological parameters that may promote uncontrolled use and relapse. These processes will be studied in both lesioned subjects and in neurologically intact subjects.