Community Prevention Trials. NIAAA supports an integrated group of community-based controlled prevention trials. The problems to be prevented include alcohol-related trauma, underage drinking, and drinking and driving. All the trials test the impact of environmental interventions (e.g., enhanced law enforcement and community coalitions). One project tests a school- and parent-based intervention, while others test media advocacy strategies or traditional mass media. Experimental and quasi-experimental designs are used. Two studies evaluate the effectiveness of naturally occurring interventions using the methodologies of natural experiments. Results to date indicate that community strategies that focus on schools, parents, and the community. Also, enduced law enforcement, media and educational campaigns, and public/private collaboration can significantly reduce drinking and driving, related driving risks, and traffic injuries and death.

National Alcohol Research Centers Program. NIAAA administers 14 diverse Alcohol Research Centers nationwide through the institute's National Alcohol Research Center Grants Program. This program is interrelated with and complementary to all other research support mechanisms and scientific activities that investigate the causes, diagnosis, treatment, control, prevention, and consequences of alcohol abuse and alcoholism. The program provides long-term (typically 5 years) support for interdisciplinary research that focuses on particular aspects of alcohol abuse, alcoholism, or other alcohol-related problems. This program encourages outstanding scientists from many disciplines to provide a full range of expertise, approaches, and advanced technologies for developing knowledge in these areas.

A primary goal of any NIAAA-funded center is to become, through excellence in science research, a significant regional or national research resource. In addition, each center affords research training opportunities for persons from various disciplines and professions. Current areas of alcohol center focus are the genetic determinants of alcohol ingestion; epidemiology of alcohol problems; environmental approaches to prevention; effects of alcohol on cellular neurobiology; alcohol and the cell; etiology and treatment of alcohol dependence; alcohol and aging; genetic approaches to the neuropharmacology of alcohol; biobehavioral manifestations of adolescent alcohol abuse; genetics of neuroadaptation to ethanol; clinical and medical epidemiology; and etiology and pharmacological treatment of alcoholism.

Studies on the effects of ethanol on cell membrane receptors, ion channels, and expression of genes coding for these important proteins are yielding intriguing insights into basic mechanisms of ethanol’s action. Combined with studies on region specific effects of ethanol on the release of neurotransmitters, these investigations will elucidate how ethanol produces reward, dependence, tolerance, and brain damage. Behavioral studies on animals, using mainly mice and monkeys, combined with molecular genetics and behavioral manipulations during development, examine important protective and causal factors for alcohol abuse and dependence.

NIAAA utilizes a combination of clinical and basic research facilities which enables a coordinated interaction between basic research findings and clinical applications in pursuit of these goals. An inpatient ward and a large outpatient program are located in the NIH Clinical Center.

Genetics of Alcoholism. This research focuses on investigating the genetic determinants of the risk for alcoholism. Studies on impulsive and violent alcoholics show that there is a clinical subgroup of alcoholics with polydrug abuse and antisocial personality features who also display deficits in serotonin function. The goal of this research is to understand how natural variants of genes involved in serotonergic neurotransmission affect human behavior. Two approaches are used: molecular cloning and expression studies of genes involved in serotonin function, and intensive behavioral and neuropsychological studies of human families and animal strains with natural variants of serotonin genes.

In conducting this research NIAAA scientists examine a variety of populations to determine how genetics and environment interact in the development of alcoholism and concomitant psychopathologies including drug abuse, antisocial personality, anxiety, and mood disorders. Techniques include family transmission studies and genetic linkage analyses using selected candidate genes and a large number of polymorphic markers.

To identify genes for complex, heterogeneous psychiatric diseases, it is helpful to define genetic characteristics which could correlate more precisely with genotypes. Neurophysiologic differences in alcoholism may serve this purpose these differences include a diminished amplitude of a specific electrophysiological trait--called the P300 evoked potential--and the low voltage alpha component of the electroencephalogram. Approaches include family transmission studies and a genetic linkage study to map the genes determining the variants. Psychiatric interviews are conducted to correlate neurophysiological phenotype with clinical phenotype and behavior.

Alcohol and Essential Fatty Acids. NIAAA researchers are investigating the biological functions of essential fatty acids and the adverse effects of alcohol on these functions. A clinical study of alcoholics has indicated that there is a loss of essential polyunsaturated fatty acids in the tissues and blood cells of these patients. Such losses are believed to be related to the tissue damage that occurs in almost every organ system in alcoholics but particularly in the liver and brain. Alcohol is perhaps the only dietary constituent that is capable of depleting the omega-3 fatty acids from the brain, and this may lead to the degeneration of neural cells and a loss in brain and visual function. An interdisciplinary approach is taken in these studies.

Losses of organ polyunsaturated fats as a consequence of chronic alcohol abuse, the underlying metabolic mechanisms and modulating nutritional factors, and the consequences for membrane function as assessed by biochemical and biophysical means are an integral part of this work. Fluorescence spectroscopy and magnetic resonance imaging are the principal tools used to study the functions of polyunsaturated phospholipids in membranes. Mass spectrometry is used for sensitive analysis of fatty acid metabolites in humans. Studies are also being conducted on the lipid requirements of the nervous system during early development, and the full range of experimental and clinical approaches available in the laboratory are employed in this effort.

Molecular Mechanisms of Alcohol Action in the Brain. Recent NIAAA research studies have demonstrated that alcohol affects signal transduction systems involved in the regulation of nerve cell excitability and the transmission of information at synapses. Using newly developed physiological and molecular biological techniques, institute scientists are working toward determining the molecular mechanisms of alcohol’s interaction with these signal transduction systems. Scientists also will investigate the molecular alterations of neural function associated with alcohol tolerance, dependence, and withdrawal. This information will improve our understanding of the molecular basis of alcohol dependence and lead to development of treatments and prevention strategies.

Mutually beneficial collaborative research efforts have been developed with other countries and international organizations. Research information is exchanged on a regular basis with over 30 countries. This office also coordinates the institute’s science education initiative. Special projects in collaboration with educators of K-12 students are in progress.

Among its many recent collaborative national and international activities, NIAAA has cosponsored projects with other institutes and organizations studying birth defects, liver disease, AIDS, women’s health, minority health, aging, and health services research. NIAAA has supported sicentific eschanges to increase the research capability of scientists in several foreign countries or to support collaborative research with grantees. The institute has responded to requests for joint research efforts, developed productive cooperative projects, or supported grantees to work with scientists in Finland, Poland, Mexico, Russia, the Czech Republic, Canada, Spain, and many other countries.

• Special reports to Congress on alcohol and health, triennial reports from the secretary of Health and Human Services to the Congress, which describe research findings and advances in the alcohol field;

• Alcohol Health & Research World,, a quarterly professional journal available by subscription;

• Alcohol Alert, a publication designed to quickly disseminate research findings to health professionals; and

• Monographs on special topics or containing papers from NIAAA-sponsored workshops on critical research areas such as women and alcohol, and alcohol and the cardiovascular system.

Scientists, clinicians, and others interested in alcohol-related research also have direct access to NIAAA’s comprehensive “Alcohol and Alcohol Problems Science Database” through Ovid Technologies, Inc.--a commercial vendor and through the NIAAA's home page on the World Wide Web (http://etoh.niaaa.nih.gov). The database title is ETOH, named after EtOH, one of the chemical designations for ethyl alcohol. ETOH covers literature from the late 1960’s to the present, contains over 93,000 bibliographic records, and covers all aspects of alcohol research: psychology, psychiatry, physiology, biochemistry, epidemiology, sociology, neuroscience, treatment, prevention, education, accidents and safety, criminal justice, legislation, employment, labor and industry, and public policy. The database also contains entries on books, monographs, government reports, dissertations, and conference papers.

Currently, NIAAA’s WWW features publications (many available as full text documents), news releases, grant and contract information, and other alcohol-related resources.