Biomedical Engineering

Author:

Ruddy, Jake Austin

Area of Honors:

Biomedical Engineering

Degree:

Bachelor of Science

Document Type:

Thesis

Thesis Supervisors:

Dr. Nanyin Zhang, Thesis Supervisor
Dr. William O Hancock, Thesis Honors Advisor

Keywords:

fMRI
alcohol
functional connectivity

Abstract:

In the United States, over sixteen million adults have a type of alcohol use disorder. With better understanding of a disorder, better treatments can be developed. The purpose of this project is to provide a better understanding of the effects of alcohol on the brain by exploring the acute effects of ethanol on brain functional connectivity in an animal model. Naive male Long Evans rats were injected with either ethanol or saline during an fMRI scan. Data analysis assessed the temporal correlation between brain regions and the rest of the brain, creating maps to compare regional differences in connectivity before and after injection. Acute ethanol administration was seen to produce effects on the conscious brain throughout the reward regions and visual areas. In particular, our data showed increased connectivity between reward and sensory processing centers; decreased connectivity between the thalamus and nucleus accumbens; as well as decreased connectivity between the hippocampus/amygdala and reward regions. These results agree with previous research that has shown that acute ethanol administration increases connectivity between sensory processing and reward centers. Additionally, these results further explain previous research that has shown changes in reward system activity in response to acute ethanol by providing a functional connectivity perspective. In the future, the experiment should be repeated with more subjects to interrogate the validity of results and to improve the statistical significance of the results.