Novel candidate genes for alcoholism — transcriptomic analysis of prefrontal medial cortex, hippocampus and nucleus accumbens of Warsaw alcohol-preferring and non-preferring rats

• Brain areas of naïve WHP and WLP rats differ in transcriptomic patterns.
• These differences comprise processes such as LTP/LTD or immune functions.
• 10 functional networks were differentially represented between strains.
• Tac4, Slc5a7, Gng7 genes may constitute novel participants of brain ethanol response.

ObjectiveAnimal models provide opportunity to study neurobiological aspects of human alcoholism. Changes in gene expression have been implicated in mediating brain functions, including reward system and addiction. The current study aimed to identify genes that may underlie differential ethanol preference in Warsaw High Preferring (WHP) and Warsaw Low Preferring (WLP) rats.MethodsMicroarray analysis comparing gene expression in nucleus accumbens (NAc), hippocampus (HP) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) was performed in male WHP and WLP rats bred for differences in ethanol preference.ResultsDifferential and stable between biological repeats expression of 345, 254 and 129 transcripts in NAc, HP and mPFC was detected. Identified genes and processes included known mediators of ethanol response (Mx2, Fam111a, Itpr1, Gabra4, Agtr1a, LTP/LTD, renin-angiotensin signaling pathway), toxicity (Sult1c2a, Ces1, inflammatory response), as well as genes involved in regulation of important addiction-related brain systems such as dopamine, tachykinin or acetylcholine (Gng7, Tac4, Slc5a7).ConclusionsThe identified candidate genes may underlie differential ethanol preference in an animal model of alcoholism.CommentNames of genes are written in italics, while names of proteins are written in standard font. Names of human genes/proteins are written in all capital letters. Names of rodent genes/proteins are written in capital letter followed by small letters.