The popular recreational drug MDMA or "ecstasy" is a selective serotonin neurotoxin in many species and has been found to be associated with memory dysfunction in human beings. Recent studies suggest that this impairment persists after cessation of use for periods up to at least one year. However, there is no clear indication as yet concerning which stage of memory processing is impaired as a...
Schizophrenia is a severe psychiatric disorder whose etiology is unknown; however, disruptions in glutamatergic and dopaminergic transmission may play a role. The NMDAR antagonist, phencyclidine (PCP), has been shown to mimic both the positive and negative symptoms of the disease and is widely used in animal studies as a model of schizophrenia. PCP administration results in increased locomotor...
Numerous animal studies have been able to demonstrate neurotoxic damage to central serotonergic systems after exposure to 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, ecstasy). It has been suggested that a high loudness dependence of auditory evoked potentials (LDAEP) and, particularly, of the tangential N1/P2 source activity is associated with a low functioning of serotonergic activity. Therefore,...
The lowering of serotonin for a period following MDMA use could account for the increases in both self-rated and objective measures of aggression previously found in ecstasy users several days after taking the drug. There is some evidence of gender differences in the acute, sub-acute and long-term effects of MDMA use, and given that gender differences have been found in aggression, it is...
Many recreational ecstasy/MDMA users display neuropsychobiological de.cits, whereas others remain problem free. This review will investigate some of the drug and non-drug factors which in.uence the occurrence of these de.cits. Acute and chronic MDMA usage are both important. Intensive use within a session is often associated with more problems. In term of lifetime usage, novice users generally...
Patients with schizophrenia exhibit disturbances of orienting of attention. However, findings have been inconsistent. Pharmacologic challenges with hallucinogens have been used as models for psychosis. The NMDA antagonist state (PCP, ketamine) resembles undifferentiated psychoses with positive and negative symptoms, while the 5-HT(2A) agonist state (LSD, dimethyltryptamine (DMT)) is thought to...
RationaleIn animal studies, the common club drug 3,4-methylendioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, “Ecstasy”) consistently caused a prolonged loss of presynaptic serotonergic neurons, and evidence suggests that MDMA consumption may also affect the human serotonergic system. Serotonin (5-HT) has been implicated in the regulation of impulsivity and such executive functions as decision-making cognition. In...
CNS Drugs2006Michael J Maher, Simon A Rego, Gregory M Asnis
Subjective reports of sleep disturbance indicate that 70-91% of patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have difficulty falling or staying asleep. Nightmares are reported by 19-71% of patients, depending on the severity of their PTSD and their exposure to physical aggression. Objective measures of sleep disturbance are inconsistent, with some studies that used these measures...
In an earlier article entitled "Meditation may predispose to epilepsy: an insight into the alteration in brain environment induced by meditation" published in Medical Hypotheses 2005:64(3):464-7, the author has hypothesized that meditation exerts predisposing influence on epileptogenesis. The hypothesis is based on certain EEG changes and electrographic features (namely hypersynchrony and...
Endogenous opioids seem to play a critical role in the regulation of mood states. For example, there is accumulating evidence that stimulation of kappa-opioid receptors, upon which the endogenous opioid dynorphin acts, can produce depressive-like behaviors in laboratory animals. Here we examined whether systemic administration of salvinorin A (SalvA), a potent and highly selective kappa-opioid...