A study of laboratory animals found that cocaine changes the way genes in their brains work.

Dr. Ian Maze, of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and author of the study, explained that genes are not just about heredity. They also regulate how cells in the body behave.

"When you give an animal a single dose of cocaine, you start to have genes aberrantly turn off and on in the strange pattern that we are still trying to figure out," he said.

Dr. Maze's study indicates that cocaine changes the region of the brain essential for experiencing pleasure and desire. This may partly explain why people get addicted to cocaine.

"This study is a major step in understanding the development of cocaine addiction and a first step toward generating ideas for how we might use epigenetic regulation to modulate the development of addiction," said Peter Kalivas, professor of neuroscience at the Medical University of South Carolina.

The study appeared in the journal Science.

Labels: brain_damage, cocaine