André Lucas Silva Borges, Rebeka Sultana, Amanda M Barkley-Levenson

Alcohol use disorders are known to be major health issues that result in a high number of direct and indirect deaths every year. The gene solute carrier 39a8 (Slc39a8), which encodes a transporter of zinc and other metals, has been found in multiple genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to be associated with alcohol consumption and problematic alcohol use. Despite this association, very few studies have characterized the relationship between Slc39a8 and ethanol-related traits. Thus, we employed ethanol conditioned place preference (CPP) and aversion (CPA), and open field tests to further understand the role of this gene in sensitivity to ethanol’s motivational, locomotor, and anxiolytic effects. Adult naïve Slc39a8 heterozygous knockout mice (HET) and their wild-type (WT) littermates of both sexes were used. For both the CPP (injections immediately before conditioning trials) and CPA (injections immediately after conditioning trials) studies, 2 g/kg injections of ethanol were paired with tactile floor cues during conditioning sessions, and floor preference/avoidance was then assessed during drug-free tests. We found no effect of genotype on aversive sensitivity to ethanol. Interestingly, HET mice showed significantly higher ethanol CPP expression than WT mice after two weeks of conditioning. This suggests Slc39a8-deficiency increases ethanol reward sensitivity without altering aversive sensitivity. In ongoing studies in our lab, we are testing the effects of increasing doses of ethanol on locomotor and anxiety-like behavior in an open field apparatus, which will add important insight on how changes in Slc39a8 expression impact sensitivity to other effects of ethanol

University of New Mexico

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