NEWS: GM mice cool ecstasy's heat

GM mice cool ecstasy's heat
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/Health/story_53419.asp

AFP - A batch of genetically-modified mice may have shown the way to thwarting one of the potentially fatal side effects of the club drug ecstasy, according to a study published in the British scientific journal Nature.

Mice that were modified to lack a key gene that regulates the temperature of skeletal muscle were immune to the dangerous overheating typically caused by MDMA, as ecstasy's chemical formula is known.

According to UN figures, use of ecstasy increased 70 per cent from 1995-2000, with a consequent increase in the number of hospitalisations and deaths from hyperthermia - overheating of muscle tissue, which leads to failure of the kidneys and other organs.

A team led by Jon Sprague from Ohio Northern University injected high doses of the drug into mice that had been engineered to lack a gene called UCP-3, which codes for a mitochondrial protein that is thought to regulate temperature in skeletal muscle cells.

The rodents stayed cool throughout and even survived doses that were fatal for normal counterparts.

Sprague's team suggests the results throw up intriguing pharmaceutical paths for stopping ecstasy from interfering with this key body thermostat.

"Agents designed to target uncoupling proteins could provide the basis for an important new therapeutic direction," they write.

mummy, can i take PMA instead now?

Interesting but trivial, IMHO. Whatever attribute it is in the human body (equivalent to this "UCP-3" gene in mice), we have it and it isn't going away. Sure, maybe in the future people could select not to have it... But who would modify their childs DNA just so they could take ecstasy without this risk? Especially when common sense will stop you from overheating anyway.

It doesn't mention the side effects of a deficiency in this gene either, and seeing as it regulates the temperature of skeletal muscle tissue, there must be something...

I think that researchers should spend their time and money chasing up neurotoxicity.

Should we make our children immune to MDMA overheating?
Eugenics here we come!

apollo said:

I think that researchers should spend their time and money chasing up neurotoxicity.

Click to expand...

neurotoxicity is directly linked to hyperthermia.

no hyperthermia = no neurotoxicity.

^^ Good point, but the research says nothing of it... Which is my little gripe - I wish that it did. I wish someone would launch an investigation into MDMA based neurotixicty in the human brain.

You reckon this means that the government is going to go ahead and develop some MDMA with some chemical that stops us all from overheating when we drop a couple of pills? I can't see that happening in my life time.

not in the pills riser, but when actually changing the mice's genetic makeup, they did not overheat.
When the MDMA is absorbed by our bodies, one reaction is an increase in our body temperature. This is due to our genetic makeup and proteins produced.
Get rid of the gene that causes this and wammo, no overheating.

These gene altered mice are not made to find a way of doing this to humans. They are done to observe the actions of a drug, without the physiological responses normally seen. The purpose may be to validate a theory on the actions of the drug i.e. to prove temperature is related to neurotoxicity, or to enable a chemical to get to a target which would otherwise be gobbled up by an enzyme before it could bind with the receptor. This may be to enable receptor/enzyme densities to be mapped with radio-labeling using PET or similar radio imaging.

While somewhat unlikely, it may be that such research will have some spinoff for user wellbeing. A suitable antagonist may be found or developed which limits stimulation of these receptors. It would have to either already exist as a pharmaceutical - perhaps already prescribed for another purpose - or, in the case of a novel or new substance, need to also be applicable to another area of pharmacology. Despite what the article states, I'm quite sure no compound would be tested for release solely as a neuroprotector when used with an illicit drug, but it may well be that such compounds may enable the use of some medicinal drugs which have may have been avoided up till now due to similar side effects.

Temperature increases (and decreases also) are associated with increased neurotoxicity with MDMA, no doubt about that. But it may also turn out, as superbabydoc mentioned, that temperature is intricately connected to the high of MDMA. There seems to have been relatively few if any observational studies done in this area.

But it may also turn out, as superbabydoc mentioned, that temperature is intricately connected to the high of MDMA.

Click to expand...

There is definite potential for truth in that statement. All of us have had the experience of leaving a warm club into the cold and feeling as sober as a judge almost immediately. Then on returning, bang its back on. Whether or not there is a direct link to the high i dont know, but it certainly can effect the experience felt at the time.