Researchers at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Duke University are investigating the results of deleting particular genes from a mouse s nervous system. Bruno Giros, the chief investigator, along with scientists from Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill, published in the journal Nature that the mechanisms of many addictive drugs, Parkinson s Disease, Schizophrenia, and several other psychiatric disorders were caused by the brains inability to regulate dopamine.
Dopamine is a key neurotransmitter in the brain.
Neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin and adrenaline are chemical messengers that cause other nerve cells to give a signal which in turn gives a message to various parts of the body or brain. When a nerve cell encounters enough neurotransmitter, the charge inside the cell changes with respect to its surroundings causing a signal in the form of an electrical impulse to be sent down the axon of the nerve cell. When the charge reaches the end of the nerve cell it causes the nerve cell to release its own neurotransmitter to another neuron jointed nearby in a joining called a synapse. Too much or too little neurotransmitter release can cause neurons to either fire too often or not enough which can lead to various disorders. The scientists removed from the mice, a protein necessary for the transport of dopamine.