Adolescent alcohol exposure promotes mechanical allodynia and alters synaptic function at inputs from the basolateral amygdala to the prelimbic cortex.

ABSTRACT: Binge drinking is common among adolescents despite mounting evidence linking it to various adverse health outcomes that include heightened pain perception. The prelimbic (PrL) cortex is vulnerable to insult from adolescent alcohol exposure and receives input from the basolateral amygdala (BLA) while sending projections to the ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (vlPAG) - two brain regions implicated in nociception. In this study, adolescent intermittent ethanol (AIE) exposure was carried out in male and female rats using a vapor inhalation procedure. Assessments of mechanical and thermal sensitivity revealed that AIE exposure-induced protracted mechanical allodynia. To investigate synaptic function at BLA inputs onto defined populations of PrL neurons, retrobeads and viral labeling were comb

SUBMITTER: Obray JD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12061479 | biostudies-literature | 2025 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature