Is it easy just to quit overdrinking? The interaction between alcohol and chromatin remodeling in brain cell

Excessive alcohol consuming is one of the major concerns of the health in worldwide. However, quit is not the only concern, the bigger issue is to deal with the withdraw symptom where anxiety is the main one. In this research, with the rat model, authors found that anxiety caused by acute alcohol were related to decreasing of histone deacetylase (HDAC) activity and increasing in acetylation of histones (H3 and H4), also the levels of CREB(cAMP-responsive element binding) binding protein (CBP), and neuropeptide Y (NPY) expression in the amygdaloid brain regions. On the other hand, by using trichostatin A, the HDAC inhibitor to block the HDAC reaction during the withdraw procedure, showing the significant decline of H3 and H4 acetylation and NPY expression in the amygdale, also effectively prevented the anxiety caused by alcohol-withdraw in rats. In this research, authors found the possible mechanism that responsible for anxiety for those during withdraw after chronic ethanol exposure. With the result of the research, it revealed the mechanism of the epigenetic regulation in brain in alcohol addicts and the potential therapeutic role of trichostatin A in treating the alcohol-withdraw symptom.

Student name: Yu-Hsuan Hsieh

Student No.: 41825037