Opioid Use Disorder Brain Study Flags 18 Candidate Gene Variants
Postmortem nucleus accumbens tissue from 20 people with opioid use disorder showed 18 candidate variants needing DNA checks and 145 genes more active, led by immune genes.
Read articleaddiction
Published research on addiction.
People of Color Link PTSD and Addiction to Racism and Sexism
In a 2026 interview study, people of color living with both PTSD and a substance use disorder described racism and sexism as part of how both conditions began.1 Women and men told different …
Read article
Substance Use Disorder Brain Connectivity in 53 Studies
A 53-study resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) meta-analysis found substance use disorder (SUD) linked to altered connectivity across prefrontal, striatal, thalamic, c…
Read article
Prior Cocaine Use Disrupts Orbitofrontal Hidden-State Coding
A 2026 eLife study recorded 3,881 lateral orbitofrontal cortex units in rats and found that prior cocaine use made the OFC over-distinguish task positions that controls treated as functional…
Read article
Drug Addiction Linked to Cortical Thinning in 65 of 68 Brain Regions
Whether alcohol, cocaine, nicotine, and cannabis damage the same brain regions or different brain regions has been hard to settle in the addiction-imaging literature. A 2026 ENIGMA Addiction…
Read article
Ketamine Addiction After One Therapeutic Dose: How Rare Is It?
Ketamine and its S-enantiomer esketamine (sold as Spravato) are now established treatments for treatment-resistant depression and acute suicidality. The standard safety pitch from sponsors a…
Read article
Trauma Reminders Increase Drug Cravings — Negative Affect Is the Link
Trauma reminders trigger substance craving — but the path runs through negative emotions, not directly. A 2026 meta-analysis quantifies the link.
Read article