5-8 Rather, we will review the basic pharmacology of amphetamine-like drugs, integrate

these molecular SB202190 manufacturer mechanisms into the brain circuitry of reward, and describe how these drugs are thought to create pathological changes in reward and learning circuitry Finally, this knowledge will be amalgamated into a vision of future pharmacotherapies for treating psychostimulant addiction. Basic pharmacology of amphetamine-like psychostimulants The defining mechanism of action of amphetamine4ike psychostimulants as a class of Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical drugs with high abuse liability is the ability to bind to dopamine transporters (DAT).9,10 Dopamine transporters are a member of a class of proteins that eliminate monoamines, including dopamine, from the synaptic cleft after neuronal release.11 This protein has a high affinity for dopamine relative to other monoamines, such as norepinephrine or serotonin, and while all the readily abused psychostimulants bind Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical to DAT, they may also bind to the other monoamine transporters with greater or lesser affinity.9,12 To some extent, the relative profile of Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical binding by individual drugs to the different transporter proteins explains

different characteristics of the drugs. Most striking, for example, is 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) which has a relatively higher affinity for serotonin transporters, and is thereby a mild hallucinogen and neurotoxic to serotonin axon terminals,13,14 Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical while methamphetamine binds more avidly to DAT, which explains its greater toxicity at dopamine terminals, as well as its propensity to induce paranoid psychosis-like symptoms.15 While Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical the binding to other monoamine transporters contributes to the antidepressant and hallucinogenic characteristics of

some psychostimulants, it is the binding to DAT that provides the major influence on abuse liability, which is the focus of this review. There are two major categories of interaction by ampetamine-like psychostimulants with DAT, but in all cases the end result is to inhibit the elimination of dopamine from the synapse and thereby increase the quantity and half-life of synaptic and extrasynaptic too dopamine levels.16,17 The first mechanism is typified by cocaine and methylphenidate that bind to DAT, but are not transported into the presynaptic terminal as surrogate dopamine. Therefore, when these drugs bind to DAT the increase in extracellular dopamine relies primarily on normal synaptic release, which is more amenable to physiological feedback regulation.18 The second mechanism is typified by amphetamines, and involves not only binding to DAT, but also translocation into the cell in place of dopamine.