Alcohol


Beer vessels dated 3500 years ago


Some people believe it provides Nutritional value, religious ceremonies, socializing

Sustained patterns of drinking

  • How much they consume

  • How quickly

  • Where?

  • The person’s biology/constitution/physical health


Continuum: physical health issues


Problems as alcohol use increase past 2 drinks daily: heart, liver bone, endocrine, pancreas, brain, gastrointestinal, and immune system


  • Toxic molecule


What determines who can and can’t drink

  • Approx 90% do not experience medical harm 

  • 10% drink harmful amounts



Risks

  • Genes

  • Family history

  • Age of onset

  • Stress

  • Sex

  • Availability  

    • It’s very available 


What is considered one drink?


Beer = malt liquor=table wine=  shots of distilled spirits 



Whose consuming?


  • 60 mil. People 12 & over reported drinking in the past month

  • 16.2 18 or older reported heavy alcohol use in past month






Heavy drinking

  • Binge drinking on 5 or more days in the past month


Binge drinking

  • A pattern of drinking alc that brings blood alcohol concentration to 0.08 percent 

  • A female has 4 or more drinks, or a male has 5 or more drinks within about 2 hrs


Binge drinking and heavy alc use can increase an individual’s risk of AUD


What is alcohol?


  • Two carbons

  • Oxygen 

  • 6 hydrogens

  • Water and fat-soluble

  • First is metabolized in the liver 


Metabolism of ethanol into toxic and caloric molecule


Binds to proteins/DNA and can cause mutations. Classified as a group 1 carcinogen by the WHOs internationa; agency for research on cancer


Most of the metabolism happens in liver


Ethanol → aceraldehyde (toxic molecule) →  acetate caoloric molecule 


The liver is stressed when having to frequently process ethanol


.02-.04: mild intoxication: relaxed

.05-.07: moderate intoxication: euphoria 

.08-.10 advanced moderate intoxication: euphoria intensifies 

.11-.15: advanced intoxication: “high” is reduced, depressive effects

cog. Function becomes impaired 

.16


Stimulant effects are seen at lower doses than the sedation effects 



The stimulant effect is not seen in all indiv.

Light drinkers don’t show stim. After 2-3 drinks

Heavy drinkers report stim effect

Light drinkers do not

Heavy drinkers report a reduced sedative response compared to light drinkers


Why the differences?


  • Alcohol works has dose-dependent responses on different receptors 


Diagnosing AUD

  • Dsm criteria can be used

  • Aud (alcohol use disorder identification test


Diagnostic criteria checklist 



If everyone cut their alc consumption in half, we could save a million lives globally


Associated harm

  • 3 mil deaths from harmful use of alc

  • 90k people die every year

  • Harmful use 



Benerfits to low to moderate abuse

  • Lower incedencve of heart disease 

  • Reduction in anxoety and stress

  • Enhanced immune system

  • Increased bone diverwsity

Heavy use harm

  • Memory prob.

  • Stroke

  • lung/liver/nuro disease

  • Cancer

  • Suppression to immune system\



Immune system

  • Aud associated with significant increase in incidence and severity of bacterial pneumonia, tuberculosis

Gut-Liver-brain axis and AUD


  • Complex multidirectional interactions between gut (gI tract)


Releasing neurotransmitter and regulating through receptors in brain

If imbalance, effects cog.


Alc creates imbalance and lasts even if they aren’t drunk (days after)

 Ethanol kills good bacteria(microbiota) and bad 

Imbalances are ass with cog issues mood changes and continued drinking behavior

Inability to stop a habit 


Barrier and when someone drinks chronically, microbiota will leak into gut


Causes intestinal inflammation 

Inflammatory molecules released (cytokines) 


Studies show that transplanting fecal matter from alc mice to nonalc mice transfers the behavioral phenotype of chronic alc use disorder to the recipients 


  • Similar depression

  • Anxiety

  • Alcolo seeking behavior 

Mice w/ induced immunoinflammatory response colonized


Mice separated in 2 grou[ps 


Not lot of time in central area when have aud given intentional fecal matter



Thiamine deficiency

  • Wernicke korsakoff syndrome

Wernice syndrome




Toxic molecule

Major difference


Associations between alc consumption and gray and white matter volumes in the uk biobank


Neural mechanisms

  • Research suggests that alc stimulatyes neurons in the ventral tegmental area cauising enhancement in epi

Dopaminergic system

  • Profound diseases in dopamine release in ventral