ArticlePsychopharmacology2026
Sex differences in nucleus accumbens circuitry engaged with binge-like ethanol drinking.
Article in Psychopharmacology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- HERO: A hierarchy-aware analysis pipeline for reducing and refining whole-brain atlas-mapped cellular datasets.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Not just neurons: glial mechanisms driving sex-specific vulnerability to withdrawal and relapse in substance use disorder.Frontiers in neuroendocrinology · 2026Review
- Nucleus accumbens core chemogenetic excitation in male mice and chemogenetic inhibition in female mice reduced ethanol reward.Biology of sex differences · 2025Article
- Midbrain ghrelin receptor signalling regulates binge drinking in a sex specific manner.Nature communications · 2025Article
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6 authors.
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Abstract
rationaleWomen tend to progress from initial alcohol use to Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) more quickly than men, highlighting the need to study sex differences in models of early-stage alcohol use. In humans and rodents, the nucleus accumbens (NAc) regulates alcohol binge drinking, a risk factor for developing AUD. However, it is unknown whether similar brain regions and NAc inputs are engaged in males and females during binge-like drinking.
methodsWe labeled NAc inputs with a viral retrograde tracer (GFP) and quantified whole-brain c-Fos to determine the regions and NAc inputs differentially engaged in male and female mice during binge-like drinking. Mice underwent a 4-day Drinking-in-the-Dark task for either ethanol or water. Immediately following drinking on day 4, periorbital blood samples were collected for determination of blood ethanol concentration, and brains were collected. c-Fos expression and c-Fos + GFP colocalization was quantified for 426 brain areas using SmartAnalytics. We employed several data and network analysis approaches to identify NAc circuits and regions engaged, and network dynamics altered by binge-like drinking.
resultsWe found that ethanol engaged significantly more NAc inputs in binge-like ethanol drinking females, as compared to males, including various GABAergic and glutamatergic regions. Moreover, we found that binge-like drinking females had 129 brain areas with greater c-Fos than males. Relative to water controls, ethanol increased network modularity and decreased connectivity in both sexes and did so more dramatically in males.
conclusionOur results support that early-stage binge-like ethanol drinking engages brain regions and NAc inputs and alters network dynamics in a sex-specific manner, which may help to explain the faster transition from initial alcohol use to AUD in women.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.