Studying fruit flies, researchers at Brown University found that alcohol hijacks a conserved memory pathway in the brain, forming the cravings that fuel addiction.

Axar.az reports that the pink areas are the fly's memory centers and the green dots are where the first molecular signaling "domino" Notch has been activated.

One of the many challenges with battling alcohol addiction and other substance abuse disorders is the risk of relapse, even after progress toward recovery. Even pesky fruit flies have a hankering for alcohol, and because the molecular signals involved in forming flies' reward and avoidance memories are much the same as those in humans, they're a good model for study.

Karla Kaun, assistant professor of neuroscience at Brown University and senior author on the paper, worked with a team of undergraduates, technicians and postdoctoral researchers to uncover the molecular signaling pathways and changes in gene expression involved in making and maintaining reward memories.

"One of the things I want to understand is why drugs of abuse can produce really rewarding memories when they're actually neurotoxins," said Kaun, who is affiliated with Brown's Carney Institute for Brain Science. "All drugs of abuse -- alcohol, opiates, cocaine, methamphetamine -- have adverse side effects. They make people nauseous or they give people hangovers, so why do we find them so rewarding? Why do we remember the good things about them and not the bad? My team is trying to understand on a molecular level what drugs of abuse are doing to memories and why they're causing cravings".