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Authors & Affiliations
Jason Bubier, Troy Wilcox, Vivek Phillip, He Hao, Michael Saul, Price Dickson, Lisa Tarantino, David Jentsch, CSNA Phenotyping Team, Elissa Chesler
Abstract
Substance use disorders (SUD) remain among the most poorly managed health conditions owing to the lack of effective management tools and treatment. Among substances that are used unhealthily, cocaine has the highest genetic heritability (>70%). The advanced mouse resources of the Collaborative Cross and Diversity Outbred (DO) population are a complementary group of mice that allow for a systems genetic analysis of heritable traits. As part of a NIDA Center for Excellence, we have phenotyped 973 DO mice using the cocaine intravenous self-administration (IVSA) paradigm, the gold standard paradigm for modeling voluntary drug use. Of these mice, 578 were able to acquire the trait of self-administration, followed by a dose-response curve, then a period of extinction and then reinstatement. However, 395 (~40%) of the mice began the phenotyping protocol but did not reach the acquisition criteria. Before being tested for IVSA, these mice were also phenotyped for behaviors associated with SUD (e.g., impulsivity, novelty seeking, etc.) and comorbidities that demonstrate genetic correlations with phenotypes and behaviors linked with substance use disorder (e.g., anxiety, stress, etc.). We identified behavioral QTL related to cocaine IVSA using this data. Finally, RNA-seq was performed on 300-400 drug naïve hippocampus and striatum DO mice to identify eQTLs. These eQTL data are available in a publicly available browser and are used to prioritize candidate genes within the behavioral QTL intervals. This large data set is being used to identify novel mechanisms underlying addiction-related phenotypes that will allow for the development of novel therapeutic targets and approaches.