成瘾相关记忆的表现遗传学机制 ─ 药物成瘾研究的新视角

Epigenetics：A Mechanism of Addictive Memory

成瘾相关记忆长期性的脑机制一直是药物成瘾研究领域的难点与热点，该文简要介绍了成瘾记忆长期性分子机制的研究脉络，提示表现遗传学修饰可能是研究药物成瘾的新视角。成瘾药物可以调节染色体不同亚型组蛋白乙酰化水平，不同基因DNA的甲基化程度从而改变染色体的空间结构，进而调节基因的表达导致成瘾，特别是DNA甲基化改变的相对的稳定性可能是成瘾记忆长期存在的分子基础。记忆再巩固过程中学习记忆相关脑区的记忆促进基因与记忆抑制基因的表现遗传学改变可能是未来研究的新趋势。

Persistent addictive memory has been one of the potential reasons to relapse. But the molecular mechanism of additive memory is not clear. Epigenetic mechanism may be of the potential substrates to keep the additive memory persistent. And it has been established that drug of abuse can modify the chromatin structures through histone acetylation and DNA methylation， and further modulate gene expression underlying long-term neural plasticity. And the epigenetic mechanism of memory reconsolidation involved memory promoting and suppressing genes will be an attractive filed in the future.