Opioid system in the medial prefrontal cortex mediates binge-like eating.

ABSTRACT: Binge eating disorder is an addiction-like disorder characterized by excessive food consumption within discrete periods of time. This study was aimed at understanding the role of the opioid system within the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) in the consummatory and motivational aspects of binge-like eating. For this purpose, we trained male rats to obtain either a sugary, highly palatable diet (Palatable rats) or a chow diet (Chow rats) for 1 hour/day. We then evaluated the effects of the opioid receptor antagonist, naltrexone, given either systemically or site-specifically into the nucleus accumbens (NAcc) or the mPFC on a fixed ratio 1 (FR1) and a progressive ratio schedule of reinforcement for food. Finally, we assessed the expression of the genes proopiomelanocortin (POMC), pro-dynorphin

SUBMITTER: Blasio A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3664255 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature