TO THE EDITOR: In a recent issue of The American Journal of Physiology Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology, Swanson et al. (3) recognized poor sleep of alcoholics and the inverse relationship between melatonin secretion and intestinal permeability or biomarker of endotoxemia in alcoholics. Namely, the decrease of plasma melatonin and its negative associated with lipopolysaccharide binding pro...

OBJECTIVES Chronic-plus-binge ethanol feeding activates neutrophils and exacerbates liver injury in mice. This study investigates how recent excessive drinking affects peripheral neutrophils and liver injury in alcoholics, and how miR-223, one of the most abundant microRNAs (miRNAs) in neutrophils, modulates neutrophil function and liver injury in ethanol-fed mice. DESIGNS Three hundred alcoh...

BACKGROUND Alcohol dependence and associated cognitive impairments apparently result from neuroadaptations to chronic alcohol consumption involving changes in expression of multiple genes. Here we investigated whether transcription factors of Nuclear Factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB) family, controlling neuronal plasticity and neurodegeneration, are involved in these adaptations in human chronic alcoho...

AIMS The goal of this paper was to determine Glutamate dehydrogenase's (GLDH) increased activity and rapid decrease in alcoholics according to last consumption of alcohol as well as to confirm that quick normalisation cannot be a sign of hepatocyte necrosis and that GLDH from rough endoplasmic reticulum exists in the serum of alcoholics. METHODS GLDH activity was assessed in 238 alcoholics ad...

BACKGROUND Evidence of reduced P3b amplitudes in chronic alcoholics and individuals at risk for developing alcoholism suggest that the P3b may be an endophenotypic marker for alcoholism. If this is the case, then long-term abstinent alcoholics (LTAAs) should exhibit reduced P3b amplitudes. Thus far, P3b studies on chronic alcoholics have focused primarily on samples with relatively short-term a...

BACKGROUND P3a amplitude differences between alcoholic and control groups have not been well defined. Because event-related potential (ERP) differences between these groups appear to be influenced by task difficulty, the present study employed a new auditory ERP paradigm, in which target/standard tone discriminability was difficult, with infrequent nontarget stimuli used to elicit the P3a. ME...

BACKGROUND Autonomic neuropathy has been reported in patients with alcoholic liver disease but information on its occurrence in patients with non-alcoholic liver disease is contradictory. AIM To assess autonomic functions in patients with alcoholic and non-alcoholic liver disease. STUDY DESIGN Autonomic function using five standard tests was examined in 20 cirrhotics (10 alcoholics and 10 n...

AIM The aim of this study was to assess whether chronic alcohol misuse affects N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor subunit concentrations in human cases, and whether male and female subjects respond differently. METHODS Real-time RT-PCR normalized to GAPDH was used to assay NR1, NR2A and NR2B subunit mRNA in superior frontal (SFC) and primary motor (PMC) cortex tissue obtained at autopsy fro...

Chronic alcoholism is associated with a marked deficit in total magnesium (tMg). However, little is known about the status of the physiologically active form, ionized magnesium (iMg). We assessed serum iMg (measured with two ion-selective electrodes, AVL 988-4 and NOVA CRT) and tMg concentrations in chronic alcoholics at admission (n = 31) and after abstinence (n = 13) and compared these result...