Special Hormone Turns off Human’s Need to Booze

I’d think hormones would lead you to drink, and probably coax you into doing other things at the bar too, like lame pickup lines.

But researchers believe lowering ghrelin, a hormone produced in the stomach, may halt the desire to drink alcohol, and over eat.

Ghrelin is also known to promote appetite.

For the study, appearing in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, found mice pumped full of ghrelin were more likely to consume alcohol, when given the choice between water and hooch.

On the flipside, mice injected with an antagonist to ghrelin resisted alcohol. Scientists believe futzing with ghrelin could be used to treat alcohol addiction.

Via EurekAlert!

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