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Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich (Germany) have shown that the endogenous cannabinoid system plays a central role in the extinction of aversive memories.
Transgenic mice without the brain cannabinoid receptor (CB1) and mice treated with a CB1 receptor antagonist showed strongly impaired extinction of fear in experiments. The animals that were conditioned to associate a musical tone with an electric shock, produced a fear reaction, and continued to react even when the tone was not followed by a shock. Normal mice quickly stopped reacting to the tone once it was not associated with a shock, but the treated mice needed much more time to forget their fear.
Dr. Beat Lutz and his team found out that the amygdala, an area of the brain central to storing memory and fear, was flooded with endocannabinoids, when the mice were gradually forgetting the learned response to the shock. The use of cannabis would not produce the same effect in humans, Lutz said, because it overflows the whole brain and is not specific enough.
Dr. Pankaj Sah, a neuroscientist at the Australian National University in Canberra said in a comment the latest findings may explain why some people with psychiatric problems try to find relief with marijuana. He suggested that people with certain psychiatric problems perhaps are self-medicating in an attempt to help their brains extinguish some painful or traumatic memory or thought.
(Sources: Marsicano G, et al. The endogenous cannabinoid system controls extinction of aversive memories. Nature 2002 Aug 1;418(6897):530-4; Sah P. Neurobiology: Never fear, cannabinoids are here. Nature 2002 Aug 1;418(6897):488-9; Reuters of 31 July 2002; Seattle Times of 1 August 2002; Abstract of Giovanni Marsicano et al. at the 2002 ICRS Meeting)
Source: International Association for Cannabis as Medicine
Transgenic mice without the brain cannabinoid receptor (CB1) and mice treated with a CB1 receptor antagonist showed strongly impaired extinction of fear in experiments. The animals that were conditioned to associate a musical tone with an electric shock, produced a fear reaction, and continued to react even when the tone was not followed by a shock. Normal mice quickly stopped reacting to the tone once it was not associated with a shock, but the treated mice needed much more time to forget their fear.
Dr. Beat Lutz and his team found out that the amygdala, an area of the brain central to storing memory and fear, was flooded with endocannabinoids, when the mice were gradually forgetting the learned response to the shock. The use of cannabis would not produce the same effect in humans, Lutz said, because it overflows the whole brain and is not specific enough.
Dr. Pankaj Sah, a neuroscientist at the Australian National University in Canberra said in a comment the latest findings may explain why some people with psychiatric problems try to find relief with marijuana. He suggested that people with certain psychiatric problems perhaps are self-medicating in an attempt to help their brains extinguish some painful or traumatic memory or thought.
(Sources: Marsicano G, et al. The endogenous cannabinoid system controls extinction of aversive memories. Nature 2002 Aug 1;418(6897):530-4; Sah P. Neurobiology: Never fear, cannabinoids are here. Nature 2002 Aug 1;418(6897):488-9; Reuters of 31 July 2002; Seattle Times of 1 August 2002; Abstract of Giovanni Marsicano et al. at the 2002 ICRS Meeting)
Source: International Association for Cannabis as Medicine
