WHAT ELSE IS NIDA DOING?
NIDA continues to support a comprehensive research portfolio on methamphetamine’s mechanism of action, physical and behavioral effects, risk and protective factors, treatments, and potential predictors of treatment success. For example, recent studies have identified genetic variants that may be associated with an individual’s response to various drugs of abuse. One such NIDA-funded study demonstrated that individuals with a particular variant of the dopamine transporter gene were less able to feel the effects of amphetamine, suggesting that people with this genotype may be protected from dependence because of a lack of reactivity to the drug. Understanding genetic risk and protective factors may aid in the development of targeted prevention efforts. At the other end of the spectrum, NIDA-supported research is also seeking to identify markers to predict which METH-dependent patients may be more likely to relapse to drug use following treatment. For example, a recent study noted that de
