For 30 years, NIDA Notes provided in-depth coverage of research findings on drug misuse and addiction. NIDA Notes was discontinued in 2021.
This is Archived content. This content is available for historical purposes only. It may not reflect the current state of science or language from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). For current information, please visit nida.nih.gov.
Problem Behaviors Can Signal Risk in Prescribing Opioids to Teens
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In the years 2007 to 2009, more than 1 in 5 high school seniors nationwide had used an opioid painkiller (e.g., Vicodin, OxyContin, Percodan, Percocet, Demerol, Dilaudid, morphine, or codeine)...
After Release, Jail Inmates’ Substance Use Patterns Relate to Their Choice of Friends
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header="Text description" The figure shows that inmates' pre-release self-assessment of their ability to exercise self-control to avoid drug use had only an indirect relationship to their actual use of...
NIDA Advisory Council Welcomes Two New Members
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The National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse introduced two new members at its May 2013 meeting at NIDA headquarters in Rockville, Maryland: New Council Members Welcomed by NIDA (left to...
Oxycodone Vaccine Passes Early Tests
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In preclinical testing, a new vaccine hindered the often-abused prescription opioids oxycodone and hydrocodone from entering the brain and suppressed one of the drugs’ signature central nervous system (CNS) effects...
Receptor May Underlie Gender Differences in Response to Smoking Cessation
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Men benefit more than women from nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) for smoking cessation because nicotine affects a key neuroreceptor differently in the two sexes, a NIDA-sponsored study suggests. The findings...
Counselors’ Perceptions of Organizational Justice and Support Predict Job Turnover
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NIDA-supported researchers who previously reported that 25 percent of counselors in a national sample of substance abuse treatment programs left their jobs voluntarily during a single year (see “High Rates...
Study Endorses Onsite HIV Testing Without Risk Reduction Counseling
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Results from NIDA’s Clinical Trials Network (CTN) affirm Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendation that health care facilities serving high-risk populations offer onsite HIV testing. Patients who were...
Gabapentin Tested To Treat Marijuana Dependence
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Marijuana-dependent outpatients who were treated with gabapentin in a pilot clinical trial reduced their cannabis use more and reported fewer symptoms of drug withdrawal than patients who received a placebo...
Q & A: Dr. Redonna Chandler
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In this video, Dr. Chandler explains what her Branch does and the ways in which her work is rewarding. The chief of NIDA's Services Research Branch talks about drug abuse...
Thoughts of Suicide May Persist Among Nonmedical Prescription Opiate Users
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People who use prescription opiates other than as ordered by a doctor are more likely to consider suicide than those who use these medications only appropriately or not at all...
Adolescent Cigarette, Alcohol Use Declines as Marijuana Use Rises
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The latest iteration of NIDA’s annual Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey brought welcome news of declines in use of cigarettes, most illicit drugs, and alcohol among 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-grade...
Deadline Approaching: U.S.-Mexico Drug Abuse Prevention Research Fellowship
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Researchers interested in applying for the NIDA U.S.-Mexico Drug Abuse Prevention Research Fellowship need to submit application materials by April 1, 2013. The Fellowship provides researchers who are citizens or...
Staff Stress Affects Patients’ Engagement in Therapy
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Substance abuse treatment is stressful work. Treatment professionals must deal with problems that are complex and urgent, often with limited resources. A NIDA-supported study suggests that outpatient drug-free programs can...
Nicotine Makes Mouse Brain More Responsive to Cocaine
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Nicotine sensitizes the mouse brain to the addictive effects of cocaine, according to recent NIDA-supported research. If the findings carry over to people, they would suggest that preventing youths from...
Seek-Test-Treat-Retain To Stop the Spread of HIV
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With the introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) for HIV in the mid-1990s, the AIDS epidemic entered a less deadly era. Although HAART does not cure HIV infection, it...
SAAF‒T Reduces African American Teens’ Substance Use, Conduct Problems
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NIDA-supported researchers have developed a family-centered prevention program for adolescents and successfully tested it in a rural African American population. Youths who participated in the intervention at age 16 reported...
N-Acetylcysteine Postsynaptic Effect Limits Efficacy
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Despite promising results in animal studies, clinical trials of N-acetylcysteine to prevent relapse to drug abuse have demonstrated only moderate efficacy. New work by NIDA-funded scientists suggests a reason why...
Crime Does Not Increase Around Methadone Clinics in Baltimore
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Citizens’ concerns that methadone treatment centers (MTCs) might be focal points for serious crime are unwarranted, a recent NIDA-supported study suggests. Dr. Susan Boyd and colleagues at the University of...
Brief Intervention Helps Adolescents Curb Substance Use
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Drug- and alcohol-involved middle and high school students markedly reduced their substance use following two 60-minute sessions that combined motivational interviewing (MI) and cognitive behavioral therapy. The students also reported...
Prenatal Methamphetamine Exposure Linked With Problems
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In the latest findings from an ongoing study of the effects of prenatal methamphetamine exposure on child development, primary caregivers reported more signs of increased emotionality, anxiety, and depression in...
Animation: Building an Anti-Drug Vaccine
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The immune system has an extraordinary ability to recognize compounds foreign to the body and eliminate them. NIDA-sponsored scientists are working to harness this ability to create vaccines that will...
Stress Receptor Mediates Lifelong Consequences of Early Trauma
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Researchers investigating how stressful experiences early in life promote later drug abuse have homed in on the glucocorticoid receptor (GR). In experiments with mice, augmenting GRs in the forebrain during...
Good Behavior Game Wins 2012 Mentor International Best Practice Award
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The Mentor Foundation recently honored the Good Behavior Game, a prevention program for young children that was developed with NIDA support. The game utilizes children’s desire for rewards to engender...
Dr. Charles O’Brien Receives the James B. Isaacson Award for Lifetime Achievement
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In September 2012, NIDA researcher Dr. Charles O’Brien received the James B. Isaacson Award from the International Society for Biomedical Research on Alcoholism. This honor is the latest in a...
Q&A: Dr. David Thomas
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Dr. David Thomas, a Program Officer in NIDA’s Behavioral and Cognitive Science Research Branch, speaks about the intertwined problems of pain and prescription opioid abuse. In this video, Dr. David...
Potential Pain Medication Targets Peripheral Nerves
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Oxycodone, hydrocodone, morphine, and other opioids are the most effective analgesic medications currently available, but they can be addictive and lethal when misused. The United States is currently experiencing an...
Animal Research Advances Effort to Develop Vaccines Against Cocaine, Heroin Abuse
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NIDA-supported vaccine developers have achieved promising preclinical results with novel formulations against cocaine and heroin. Laboratory animals treated with the new vaccines produced high blood concentrations of anti-drug antibodies and...
Intervention Boosts Treatment Participation, Abstinence Among Depressed Women
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A new analysis of data from a trial in which intensive case management (ICM) outperformed usual care among women receiving welfare (see “ Intervention Improves Abstinence, Employment Among Welfare Recipients”)...
Few Teens With Prescription Opioid Use Disorders Receive Treatment
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Researchers who previously found that about 1 percent of adolescents report symptoms of abuse or dependence on prescription opioid analgesics (“ Some Teens Reporting Nonmedical Use of Prescriptions Develop Disorders”)...
PhenX Toolkit Provides Standard Measures for Research
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NIDA researchers working with human subjects now have a new resource at their fingertips: the PhenX Toolkit’s new Substance Abuse and Addiction (SAA) collection. The Toolkit—a collaboration between NIDA, RTI...
Program Reduces Recidivism Among Men With Co-occurring Disorders
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A modified therapeutic community program designed by NIDA-supported researchers helped male parolees with co-occurring substance abuse and mental health disorders adjust to living in their communities. In a prior study...
Prenatal Cocaine Exposure Increases Monkeys' Impulsivity Into Adulthood
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Dr. Michael Nader and colleagues at Wake Forest University School of Medicine are conducting an ongoing study of the effects of prenatal cocaine exposure throughout the lifetimes of a cohort...
Adolescent Smoking and Drinking at Historic Lows
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Rates of adolescent cigarette smoking and alcohol drinking stood at historic lows in 2011, but marijuana use trended upward, according to the 2011 Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey. The findings...
Training Gaps for Evidence-Based Practices
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Bar graph shows that cognitive-behavioral therapy is used at more privately funded substance abuse treatment programs than three other evidence-based treatments: motivational interviewing, contingency management, and brief strategic family
More Convenient Preparations of Buprenorphine Pass Test
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New soluble-film preparations of buprenorphine suppressed heroin abusers’ withdrawal symptoms with no serious side effects in a recent clinical trial. These preparations offer potential advantages over currently used tablet forms...
The Present and Promise of mHealth
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Only 15 percent of people who need drug abuse treatment seek help, in part because it is difficult to take the first step. Responding to this issue, NIDA researchers have...
Prevention System Has Lasting Effects, Benefit Exceeds Costs
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Each $1 that towns invested in Communities That Care (CTC) during a 5-year randomized trial of the prevention system set the stage for a return of $5.30, according to Drs...
Buprenorphine During Pregnancy Reduces Neonate Distress
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A NIDA-supported clinical trial, the Maternal Opioid Treatment: Human Experimental Research (MOTHER) study, has found buprenorphine to be a safe and effective alternative to methadone for treating opioid dependence during...
Neuroscience Education Program Encourages Learning at All Ages
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Eight new grants administered by NIDA aim to channel students' natural fascination with their behavior and their brains into appreciation and enthusiasm for neuroscience. Grantees are developing K-12 education programs...
Dr. David Jentsch Receives the 2011 Waletzky Memorial Award
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Dr. J. David Jentsch, professor in the Departments of Psychology-Behavioral Neuroscience and Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Science at the University of California, Los Angeles, is the recipient of the 2011 Jacob...
Elevated Rates of Drug Abuse Continue for Second Year
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Illicit drug use continued at elevated rates in 2010, after rising in 2009 to its highest level since 2002, according to the latest National Survey on Drug Use and Health...
Investigators Map Functional Networks in the Rat Brain
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NIDA-funded researchers have made the first map of the intrinsic functional organization of the rat brain. To achieve the milestone, Drs. Zhifeng Liang, Jean King, and Nanyin Zhang of the...
Research Focuses on Groups With High Smoking Rates
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In the 60 years since public health researchers first established that cigarettes cause lung cancer, the percentage of Americans who smoke has dropped from 40 to 20. Yet despite all...
Vouchers Improve Mothers’ Smoking Abstinence and Newborns’ Weight
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Voucher payments for not smoking during pregnancy help women to stop using tobacco and boost the growth of their infants, according to an analysis of data from three controlled trials...
Tobacco Smokers Have High Probability of Transition to Dependence
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First-time smokers have a 68 percent chance of sooner or later becoming nicotine dependent, according to a recent estimate based on national survey data. The probability of first-time alcohol, cocaine...
Antiretroviral Treatment Reduces Spread of HIV Among Injection Drug Users
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Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) not only benefits the health of individuals with HIV and a history of injection drug use but also reduces transmission of the virus to others...
Alleviation of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder May Improve Addiction Treatment
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In a recent NIDA-funded study, women responded better to substance abuse treatment after their post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms improved, but reductions in substance abuse did not ease PTSD severity...
Desire to Smoke Subsides, But Cigarette Cues Retain Power
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A study by Drs. Gillinder Bedi and Harriet de Wit of the University of Chicago and Drs. Kenzie Preston, David Epstein, and Stephen Heishman of the NIDA Intramural Research Program...
Women and Sex/Gender Differences Research Program
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Since its inception, NIDA has sponsored research on issues related to women. Beginning with an early focus on the effects of drug use on pregnant women and the children they...
Cognitive Strategy Reduces Craving by Altering Brain Activity
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Addiction makes it difficult for people to look beyond immediate gratification to the longer term consequences of their actions. Accordingly, patients in drug abuse treatment are often coached to make...
Well-Known Mechanism Underlies Benzodiazepines' Addictive Properties
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Since their introduction in the 1960s, drugs categorized as benzodiazepines, which include diazepam (Valium) and alprazolam (Xanax), have been widely prescribed to treat anxiety and insomnia, alcohol withdrawal, and other...
Physical Activity Reduces Return to Cocaine Seeking in Animal Tests
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Aerobic exercise might help cocaine abusers establish and maintain abstinence, recent NIDA-funded animal research suggests. In two independent studies, running on an exercise wheel reduced rats’ cocaine seeking during forced...
Home Visits by Nurses to Low-Income First-Time Mothers Yield Enduring Benefits
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Home visits by nurses to low-income first-time mothers, starting during pregnancy and extending into the second year of their children’s lives, have a positive and long-lasting impact on families. The...
High Rates of Job Leaving Among Addiction Counselors
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In the course of a single year, one in three substance abuse counselors and about one in four clinical supervisors in a national sample of 27 treatment organizations left their...
New Method Uncovers How Internal States Influence the Living Brain to Change Behavior
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In an innovative NIDA-funded study, published in Cell, scientists introduced a modified dopamine receptor gene into the brain of a living vinegar fly, such that when dopamine bound to this...
Nicotine Dependence Linked to Higher Rates of Mental Disorders Among Teens
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Teens who reported more symptoms of nicotine dependence in a recent study had higher prevalence of mood, anxiety, and disruptive (attention deficit hyperactivity, conduct, oppositional defiant) disorders. Researchers attributed the...
In Animals, Receptor Puts Brakes on Nicotine Consumption
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Some people smoke a few cigarettes now and then, while others smoke 30, 40, or more per day. NIDA-supported research now suggests that smokers' differences in tobacco consumption reflect, in...
NIDA Announces Avant-Garde Medication Development Awards
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Two scientists who are developing vaccines to treat addiction are the recipients of NIDA’s 2011 Avant-Garde Awards for Innovative Medication Development Research. Dr. Thomas Kosten of Baylor College of Medicine...
Peers Increase Teen Driving Risk via Heightened Reward Activity
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New research on the adolescent brain provides support for laws, existing in some locales, that prohibit teen drivers from having peers as passengers. Drs. Laurence Steinberg and Jason Chein at...
Stimulant Abusers' Regard for Future Improves With Memory Training
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Compared to most other people, addicted individuals typically place a much higher premium on immediate gratification compared to future rewards. One scientific theory attributes this trait to weakness in a...
Individual Differences in Decisionmaking Style May Predict Teen Problems
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Immediacy Adds Weight The value of a reward appears enhanced when it is provided right away and discounted when it is scheduled for a later date. The tendency to highly...
Program Helps Troubled Boys Reduce Substance Abuse
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Fostering Self Control: Youth in Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care live with foster parents who help them develop control over their behavior. Foster parents implement a system in which youths earn...
Marker for Neuronal Damage Resolves a Year after Methamphetamine
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Dr. Ruth Salo and colleagues at the University of California, Davis, extended previous findings that biochemical markers for nerve damage and viability persist in the brain through 6 months of...
Financial Strain Hinders Smoking Cessation
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Incorporating measures to help patients deal with financial strain might improve success rates of antismoking interventions, say researchers at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. In a clinical...
Substance Abuse Among Older Adults
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The percentage of American 50- to 59-year-olds who reported having abused illicit or prescription drugs during the past year more than doubled, from 2.7 percent to 6.2 percent, between 2002...
Resting Brain Studies Shed New Light on Vulnerabilities
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Findings from a recent NIDA-funded study represent early fruits of research on a recently recognized network of brain circuits. Dr. Elliott Hong and colleagues at the University of Maryland School...
Nanotechnology Powers Smart Skin Patch
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NIDA-funded researchers have conducted a successful in vitro demonstration of a prototype programmable medication skin patch. As envisioned by developers Drs. Bruce Hinds and Audra Stinchcomb of the University of...
Disruption of Neuron Production in Adult Rats Increases Cocaine Taking
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Although most brain regions stop producing new neurons once the organ reaches full maturity, neurogenesis continues throughout life in the hippocampus, a structure crucial to learning and memory. Recent NIDA-funded...
Molecular Alterations of DNA Contribute to Persistence of Memory
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Addiction is tenacious: People who are in recovery remain vulnerable to relapse even after years of abstinence. Often, it is memory that reawakens the craving. The dormant desire can return...
New Class of Regulators for Addiction Genes
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MicroRNAs, snippets of RNA that were first recognized only 2 decades ago, are turning out to be important players in a wide variety of biological processes. They have been implicated...
NIDA Recognizes Developer of a New Business Model for Science
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Dr. Redonna K. Chandler, chief of NIDA's Services Research Branch in the Division of Epidemiology, Services and Prevention Research, is the recipient of the Institute's 2011 Innovator Award. Dr. Chandler...
Girls More Likely Than Boys to Use Ecstasy
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From 2002 through 2008, among adolescents aged 12 to 17, girls' rates of lifetime ecstasy use were higher than boys'. This pattern contrasts with that for marijuana, which boys used...
Good-Bye, Paper
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Starting in early 2012, after 25 years in print, NIDA Notes will become exclusively a Web publication. In its dynamic new format, NIDA Notes will continue to provide the same...
NIDA's Drug Abuse Research Advances Science as a Whole
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Drug abuse and addiction disrupt brain processes that govern fundamental capacities of motivation, memory, and learning. It is no wonder, then, that scientists seeking answers to addiction make discoveries that...
Week-Long Events Teach Teens Drug Abuse Facts
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Daevion Caves and Jordan Atkins won first place in the Awareness Through Music Contest With NIDA's encouragement and support, local communities and organizations in more than 20 States sponsored events...
High Rates of Illegal Drug Use Among Alcohol-Dependent Adults
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Adults dependent on alcohol report high rates of illegal drug use and nonmedical use of prescription drugs, as compared with the general population. Seventy percent of those with alcohol dependence...
Computer-Based Intervention Offers Good Value for Money
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NIDA-funded researchers have for the first time demonstrated the economic value of a computer-based treatment as an adjunct to standard addiction therapy. Dr. Todd Olmstead of George Mason University and...
Medication Reduces Rats' Return to Methamphetamine Seeking
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A new medication strategy shows promise for preventing relapse to drug abuse, new animal research suggests. Dr. Patrick M. Beardsley at Virginia Commonwealth University, Dr. Kirk Johnson at MediciNova, Inc...
Drugs Contribute to High Rates of Sexually Transmitted Diseases Among Juvenile Offenders
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In a study of 948 newly arrested youths undergoing criminal justice intake processing in Tampa, Florida, more than 19 percent of girls and 11 percent of boys tested positive for...
NIDA Cosponsors Mentoring Service for Clinicians Advising Substance-Abusing Patients
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With a free phone call or email, primary care clinicians can tap a mentor for help with a sensitive subject: how to address alcohol, tobacco, and drug abuse among patients...
Grantee Wins Early Career Award
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Dr. Mauricio R. Delgado of Rutgers University in Newark. NIDA grantee Dr. Mauricio R. Delgado of Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey, received a 2010 Presidential Early Career Award for...
Treatment Dropout Linked With Elevated Stress Response
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A stress-related biological marker in saliva can predict how long a drug user will remain in treatment. In a recent study of men and women entering a residential treatment center...
Office Meets Dynamic Challenges of Diversity
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Although drug abuse touches the lives of people from all racial and ethnic backgrounds, its consequences are borne unequally. Members of minority populations often experience far worse outcomes than whites...
NIDA's Funding Priorities To Remain Constant
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In these tough budget times, it is not surprising that rumors will take hold about where we will direct our funding priorities at NIDA. To counter with facts, I would...
Intensive Interventions Reduce Risky Sexual Behaviors
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Multi-session motivational and behavioral training targeted specifically to men or women can cut substance abusers' high-risk sexual behaviors more effectively and enduringly than a typical single preventive educational intervention. In...
Prison Use of Medications for Opioid Addiction Remains Low
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An estimated 200,000 people with heroin addiction pass through U.S. criminal justice systems each year, and few of them receive methadone or buprenorphine therapy. In response to a nationwide survey...
Gene Influences Impact of Maternal Smoking on Children's Behavioral Problems
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The MAOA gene encodes an enzyme, monoamine oxidase A, that influences fetal brain development and regulates communication in brain circuits throughout life. NIDA-funded researchers have demonstrated that the combination of...
Neuropeptide Promotes Behaviors Tied to Addiction and Overeating
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Three teams of NIDA-funded investigators have implicated the neuropeptide orexin (also called hypocretin) in responses that can foster the transition from casual cocaine use to regular abuse and relapse. Two...
Methamphetamine Abuse Undermines Dental Health
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Clinicians have long observed that methamphetamine users often have extreme dental decay. Now researchers have, for the first time, provided scientific evidence of this condition and shed light on how...
HIV Treatment Interruption Is Pervasive After Release From Texas Prisons
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Nearly all Texas state prisoners who receive antiretroviral therapy while incarcerated experience some treatment interruption following their release, according to a new NIDA-funded study by Dr. Jacques Baillargeon of the...
Brain Responds to Marijuana Cues in Familiar Manner
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Cravings triggered by marijuana-related cues, such as a marijuana pipe, are associated with a pattern of brain activity similar to that which accompanies cravings for other drugs, say NIDA-funded researchers...
Teenage Marijuana Use Is on the Rise
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A growing percentage of students in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades are using marijuana on a regular basis, according to the 2010 Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey. Most notably...
Dr. Paul Kenny Receives the 2010 Waletzky Memorial Award
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Dr. Paul Kenny, associate professor in the Department of Molecular Therapeutics on the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute, is the recipient of the 2010 Jacob P. Waletzky Memorial...
Two NIDA Grantees Receive Sarnat Prize
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Two prominent addiction scientists—Dr. Eric J. Nestler and Dr. Charles P. O'Brien—received the 2010 Rhoda and Bernard Sarnat International Prize in Mental Health. The Institute of Medicine presented the prize...
Fewer Girls Are Smoking, But Change Is Uneven
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Rates of cigarette smoking among girls in the eighth grade rose during the early 1990s but then fell sharply between 1995 and 2007. However, racial and ethnic differences persist. Smoking...
Prevention Program Reduces Later Risky Sexual Behaviors
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Teens who participated in the school-based drug abuse prevention program Project ALERT were less likely than peers to engage in risky sexual behaviors as young adults, report NIDA-funded researchers. Dr...
Physical Activity May Prevent Substance Abuse
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From the minute they arrive at the park, children move constantly. They run, jump, chase, and climb. Wrapped up in their fun, they aren't thinking about the health-promoting effects of...
Cocaine Alters Production of Hundreds of Proteins
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Chronic cocaine abuse may alter the production of more than 1,000 proteins in the neurons of the brain's reward system. The finding by NIDA-funded researchers sets the stage for new...
Combination Therapy Most Effective for Helping Smokers Quit
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In a randomized clinical trial of five smoking-cessation treatments, a combination of the nicotine patch and nicotine lozenge produced the greatest benefit, relative to placebo treatment, in helping people quit...
Prevention Program Averts Initiation of Alcohol and Tobacco Use
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In the first randomized trial of Communities That Care (CTC), middle school students in towns that utilized the prevention system reported less delinquency, initiation of alcohol and tobacco use, and...