Neuronal mRNA Translation in Addiction

Addictive drugs trigger persistent synaptic and structural changes in the neuronal reward circuits that are thought to underlie the development of drug-adaptive behavior. While transcriptional and epigenetic modifications are known to contribute to these circuit changes, accumulating evidence indicates that altered mRNA translation is also a key molecular mechanism. This chapter reviews recent studies demonstrating how addictive drugs alter protein synthesis and/or the translational machinery and how this leads to neuronal circuit remodeling and behavioral changes. Future work will determine precisely which neuronal circuits and cell types participate in these changes. The chapter summarizes current methodologies for identifying cell type-specific mRNAs whose translation is affected by drugs of abuse and gives recent examples of the mechanistic insights into addiction they provide.