EAB MS Thesis Defense Seminar: "The Association between Binge Eating and Alcohol Use in a Mouse Model" -Keisha Abreu

EAB MS Thesis Defense Seminar: "The Association between Binge Eating and Alcohol Use in a Mouse Model"

Keisha Abreu

Graduate Program in Endocrinology and Animal Biosciences, Rutgers

We hypothesize that alcohol use disorder (AUD) and binge eating disorder (BED) share the same neurocircuitry within the brain’s reward system. This hypothesis is based, in part, on the comorbidity between AUD and BED in humans. In this study, we used male and female C57BL6J mice to test our hypothesis that binge eating can make an individual more sensitive to alcohol, and vice versa. Briefly, mice were exposed to a binge eating paradigm of 15 binge episodes, and then sensitivity to the locomotor effects of alcohol were tested. Another group of mice were treated with chronic binge alcohol, and intake on a binge eating paradigm was examined.