title: Binge drinking differentially affects cortical and subcortical microstructure.
abstract: Young adult binge drinkers represent a model for endophenotypic risk factors for alcohol misuse and early exposure to repeated binge cycles. Chronic or harmful alcohol use leads to neurochemical, structural and morphological neuroplastic changes, particularly in regions associated with reward processing and motivation. We investigated neural microstructure in 28 binge drinkers compared with 38 matched healthy controls. We used a recently developed diffusion magnetic resonance imaging acquisition and analysis, which uses three-compartment modelling (of intracellular, extracellular and cerebrospinal fluid) to determine brain tissue microstructure features including neurite density and orientation dispersion index (ODI). Binge drinkers had reduced ODI, a proxy of neurite complexity, in frontal cortical grey matter and increased ODI in parietal grey matter. Neurite density was higher in cortical white matter in adjacent regions of lower ODI in binge drinkers. Furthermore, binge drinkers had higher ventral striatal grey matter ODI that was positively correlated with binge score. Healthy volunteers showed no such relationships. We demonstrate disturbed dendritic complexity of higher-order prefrontal and parietal regions, along with higher dendritic complexity of a subcortical region known to mediate reward-related motivation. The findings illustrate novel microstructural abnormalities that may reflect an infnce of alcohol bingeing on critical neurodevelopmental processes in an at-risk young adult group.
authors.affiliation: Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.|Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Laurel S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Morris
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Nicholas G
authors.initials: NG
authors.lastname: Dowell
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Mara
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cercignani
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Neil A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Harrison
authors.affiliation: Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.|Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Valerie
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Voon
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D063425:Binge Drinking / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D001921:Brain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology; D003712:Dendrites / Q000473:pathology; D038524:Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D066128:Gray Matter / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016501:Neurites / Q000473:pathology; D066328:Ventral Striatum / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D055815:Young Adult