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Molecular mechanisms engaged in the development of drug addiction
Pallag, Gergely ; Novotný, Jiří (advisor) ; Nerandžič, Vladimír (referee)
Drug use is part of the human life from the ancient times. Besides their recreational utilization, sustained misuse of these substances can lead to the development of drug addiction especially in susceptible individuals and thus cause serious health and social problems. The aim of this thesis is to briefly introduce brain structures which are affected by addictive substances, and describe some of the mechanisms and molecules that contribute to addiction. A crucial brain structure which plays a role in drug addiction is the reward system, with dopamine as the main neurotransmitter. After repeated use of drugs, in neurons of this system certain molecules and epigenetic changes are accumulating that promote chronic nature of addiction. Especially important is the highly stable transcription factor ΔFosB, which in cooperation with other molecules promotes relapse even after several months or years of the last drug use. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)
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The influence of the nucleus accumbens on perception of facial expressions
VALUCHOVÁ, Kateřina
The bachelor thesis deals with the research of the stimulation of nucleus accumbens with laughter and the influence of this stimulation on the perception of facial expressions. The theoretical part is focused on an anatomical and functional description of nucleus accumbens and related researches. The information on laughter, facial expressions as well as electroencephalography (EEG) and event related potentials (ERP) are processed in the theoretical part. The empirical part introduces a research methodology that aims to determine the influence of laughter and associated nucleus accumbens stimulation on the perception and evaluation of neutral and positive facial expressions (obtained from the KDEF database). The experiment was attended by 16 subjects. The funny videos were showed to the subjects and each of them had the task to evaluate the presented facial expression. Neural data were obtained using an electroencephalogram and processed through the Matlab program, specifically in its EEGlab toolbox. Behavioral data were processed in the Statistica program and a paired T-test was used for statistical analysis. The final analysis of neural and behavioral data included 15 subjects. The resulting analysis showed that despite the stimulation with a humorous stimulus there was a different treatment and evaluation of neutral and positive facial expressions at both neural and behavioral level, which was in contradiction with the established hypotheses. The results did not show that the humorous stimulus used to stimulate nucleus accumbens had a statistically significant effect on the evaluation of facial expressions.
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Molecular mechanisms engaged in the development of drug addiction
Pallag, Gergely ; Novotný, Jiří (advisor) ; Nerandžič, Vladimír (referee)
Drug use is part of the human life from the ancient times. Besides their recreational utilization, sustained misuse of these substances can lead to the development of drug addiction especially in susceptible individuals and thus cause serious health and social problems. The aim of this thesis is to briefly introduce brain structures which are affected by addictive substances, and describe some of the mechanisms and molecules that contribute to addiction. A crucial brain structure which plays a role in drug addiction is the reward system, with dopamine as the main neurotransmitter. After repeated use of drugs, in neurons of this system certain molecules and epigenetic changes are accumulating that promote chronic nature of addiction. Especially important is the highly stable transcription factor ΔFosB, which in cooperation with other molecules promotes relapse even after several months or years of the last drug use. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)
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