Insects May Get Addicted to Drugs like Humans, Suggests Study
The term “substance abuse” has always been used to explain an illicit use of drugs by humans. However, scientists think differently and discover things that are hard to believe, and yet interesting to know about them. In an attempt to find out how drug abuse affects people neurochemically, a team of researchers in the United States have turned their attention to some uncommon drug addicts — ants.
According to a study published online in the Journal of Experimental Biology, social insects are likely to develop drug dependency. The researchers, led by Brian V. Entler, a neuroscientist at the University of Scranton, strongly believe that the finding can be helpful in understanding the way addiction affects the human community.
Ants can get hooked on drugs too
To understand the intricacies of substance abuse, it was sensible not to use humans as a sample group. Therefore, the researchers decided to opt for ants that live in groups and can be an appropriate sample for the study.
The aim of the study was to understand if ants could develop addiction to drugs. To analyze this, a “sucrose-fading procedure” was used that involved offering a bowl of sugar water to two groups of ants. The amount of sugar mixed in each bowl was gradually decreased over the next four days. One of the bowls offered to an ant group also contained morphine, which was not decreased in its concentration during the entire duration. On the fifth day of the study, it was observed that the ants in the morphine group chose to return to their now-sugarless bowl still containing morphine as opposed to the other group of ants.
Ants may like drugs more than sugar
The researchers also managed to find out the level of addiction developed in ants. This was done by offering the junkie ants and a new group of untrained control ants a sugar-only bowl and a morphine-only bowl. Surprisingly, it was observed that 65 percent of addict ants went for the morphine bowl, while most control ants chose the sugar bowl.
“As anyone who’s ever had ants in their kitchen knows ants really like sugar. But we showed that (the addict group) foraged much more on morphine than on their natural reward, sugar,” said Marc Seid, a neuroscientist at the University of Scranton and the study’s senior author.
The sugar-morphine experiment was followed up by another study done to understand the changes in the neurochemistry of the ants. This study revealed that the morphine addicts had notably higher levels of dopamine as compared to the control ants. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter associated with the brain’s reward and pleasure centers.
No strong evidence showing ants addicted to drug
Some researchers who were not involved in the study believe that there is no evidence to confirm that the addiction in ants actually developed. “It is possible that the ants in the study got addicted to morphine, but the authors don’t show evidence for addiction,” said Wulfila Gronenberg, a neuroscientist at the University of Arizona. Taking this study to an advanced level might help in getting an insight about addiction and, maybe, a possible solution sometime soon.
Coming back to human beings, opioids, such as methadone, oxycodone and hydrocodone, are the main cause of drug overdose deaths in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 33,000 deaths due to opioid overdose were reported in 2015.
Fight against addiction
If you know someone who is addicted to a drug and is looking for the inpatient substance abuse treatment centers in Colorado or outpatient substance abuse treatment centers in Colorado, contact the Colorado Substance Abuse Advisors for assistance. You can call at our 24/7 helpline number (866) 300–5857 and our representatives will assist you with the relevant information.