PMID- 14659969
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20040210
LR  - 20190701
IS  - 0024-3205 (Print)
IS  - 0024-3205 (Linking)
VI  - 74
IP  - 7
DP  - 2004 Jan 2
TI  - Multiple molecular and neuropharmacological effects of MDMA (Ecstasy).
PG  - 803-14
AB  - 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), commonly referred to as Ecstasy, is a 
      widely abused, psychoactive recreational drug, which induces short- and long-term 
      neuropsychiatric behaviors. This drug is neurotoxic to serotonergic neurons in 
      vivo, and induces programmed cell death in cultured human serotonergic cells and 
      rat neocortical neurons. Over the years it has been shown that MDMA alters the 
      release of several neurotransmitters in the brain, it induces recompartmentation 
      of intracellular serotonin and c-fos, and modifies the expression of a few genes. 
      Recently, we observed changes in gene expression in mice treated with MDMA, and 
      cloned and sequenced 11 cDNAs thus affected (4 correspond to known and 7 to 
      unknown genes). The effect of MDMA on two of these genes, GABA transporter 1 and 
      synaptotagmin IV was studied in detail. Characterization of the relationship 
      between a given gene and certain physiological or behavioral effects of MDMA 
      could shed light on the mechanism of the drug's action. However, establishing 
      such a connection is difficult for several reasons, including that serotonergic 
      neurons are not the only cells affected by MDMA. In this review, molecular and 
      neurochemical events that occur in the brain following exposure to MDMA, and link 
      between the observed molecular changes with known physiological effects of the 
      drug are discussed. It is indicated that MDMA alters the expression of several 
      proteins involved in GABA neurotransmission, thus having critical effect on 
      thermoregulation and MDMA acute toxicity. This analysis should facilitate 
      development of novel approaches to prevent deleterious effects, especially 
      mortality induced by MDMA and other abused psychostimulants.
FAU - Simantov, Rabi
AU  - Simantov R
AD  - Department of Molecular Genetics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, 
      Israel. lgrabi@wicc.weizmann.ac.il
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Review
PL  - Netherlands
TA  - Life Sci
JT  - Life sciences
JID - 0375521
RN  - 0 (Hallucinogens)
RN  - KE1SEN21RM (N-Methyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine)
SB  - IM
MH  - Animals
MH  - Behavior/*drug effects
MH  - Cells, Cultured
MH  - Gene Expression/*drug effects
MH  - Hallucinogens/*pharmacology
MH  - Humans
MH  - Mental Disorders/*chemically induced/psychology
MH  - Mice
MH  - N-Methyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine/*pharmacology
RF  - 95
EDAT- 2003/12/09 05:00
MHDA- 2004/02/11 05:00
CRDT- 2003/12/09 05:00
PHST- 2003/12/09 05:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2004/02/11 05:00 [medline]
PHST- 2003/12/09 05:00 [entrez]
AID - S0024320503009469 [pii]
AID - 10.1016/j.lfs.2003.08.002 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - Life Sci. 2004 Jan 2;74(7):803-14. doi: 10.1016/j.lfs.2003.08.002.