This program for Ph.D. and postdoctoral students will train specialists who will be able to conduct preclinical research at levels ranging from the molecular to the behavioral on biological mechanisms underlying the development, maintenance, and elimination of alcoholism. Twenty members of the graduate faculty of the Oregon Health Sciences University will train postdoctoral research fellows and graduate students matriculating into programs in Behavioral Neuroscience or Neuroscience. Training will include firm curricular grounding in the basic sciences, specific training in the pharmacology of alcohol and other abused drugs, exposure to clinical and psychosocial aspects of human alcoholism, and extensive and continuous participation in basic research. The focus of our training opportunities is on biological processes involved in the etiology of problem drinking and alcoholism. Our general approach is interdisciplinary, emphasizing genetic, molecular, physiological, pharmacological and psychological/ behavioral processes. The research questions addressed by trainees fall into four general areas: (a) genetic bases for alcohol and drug responses, (b) learned and unlearned determinants of alcohol and drug reward, biological bases for self-administration of alcohol and drugs, and (d) stress and the biology of alcoholism and drug abuse. These areas reflect the research interests and expertise of a participating faculty using behavioral, systems-level, and cellular/molecular methods. Their shared biobehavioral perspective is consistent with growing evidence indicating that many forms of human alcoholism are best understood in terms of an interaction between genetic and environmental factors. Areas of faculty collaboration include: studies of genetic determinants of alcohol and drug responses; neuroendocrine and neuroactive steroid participation in alcohol's effects; studies of dopaminergic, gabaergic and glutaminergic systems involved in alcohol and drug effects; study of learned and unlearned determinants of responses to alcohol and other drugs, particularly their rewarding effects and self-administration; and studies of sensitivity, tolerance, and dependence/withdrawal phenomena for alcohol and all major classes of drugs of abuse.
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