Take care of your actin so you can drink more

Two great and curious papers came out last week in Cell.

They found that interfering with pathways that regulate the actin cytoskeleton prevent effects induced by ethanol. In other words, if you prevent actin remodeling, you can drink more without getting drunk.

In one paper (Rothenfluh et al.) a RhoGAP was identified in a drosophila screening for ethanol-induced behavior changes. They found that inhibition of this protein, that negatively regulates Rho and Rac, originate flies that are more resistant to ethanol.

In the other paper (Offenhäuser et al.), the authors revisited Eps8 knockout mice to find out that these mice are more resistant to ethanol than their wild-type neighbours. Eps8 is involved in NMDA-dependent remodeling of the actin cytoskeleton, through regulation of cofilin, an F-actin severing protein, however the intermediate players are not known.

ref:
Increased Ethanol Resistance and Consumption in Eps8 Knockout Mice Correlates with Altered Actin Dynamics

Nina Offenhäuser, Daniela Castelletti, Lisa Mapelli, Blanche Ekalle Soppo, Maria Cristina Regondi, Paola Rossi, Egidio D'Angelo, Carolina Frassoni, Alida Amadeo, Arianna Tocchetti, Benedetta Pozzi, Andrea Disanza, Douglas Guarnieri, Christer Betsholtz, Giorgio Scita, Ulrike Heberlein, and Pier Paolo Di Fiore
Cell, Vol 127, 213-226, 06 October 2006


Distinct Behavioral Responses to Ethanol Are Regulated by Alternate RhoGAP18B Isoforms

Adrian Rothenfluh, Robert J. Threlkeld, Roland J. Bainton, Linus T.-Y. Tsai, Amy W. Lasek, and Ulrike Heberlein
Cell, Vol 127, 199-211, 06 October 2006