Paternal alcohol exposure in mice alters brain NGF and BDNF and increases ethanol-elicited preference in male offspring.

The present study was aimed at examining spatial learning and memory in 33 menand 12 women with alcohol use disorder (AUD) undergoing ethanol detoxification byusing a virtual Morris task. As controls, we recruited 29 men and 10 women amongepisodic drinkers without a history of alcohol addiction and/or alcohol relateddiseases. Elevated latency to the first movement in all trials was observed only inAUD persons, furthermore, control women had higher latencies compared to controlmen. Increased time spent to reach the hidden platform in the learning phase wasfound for women of both groups compared to men, in particular during trial 3. Aspredicted AUD persons (more evident in men) spent less time in the target quadrantduring the probe trial, however, AUD women had higher latencies to reach theplatform in the visible condition during trials 6 and 7 that resulted to be associatedhigher distance moved. As for the probe trial men of both groups showed increasedvirtual locomotion compared to the women of both groups. The present investigationconfirms and extends previous studies showing i: different gender responses inspatial learning tasks; ii: some alterations due to alcohol addiction in virtual spatiallearning and iii: differences between AUD men and AUD women in spatialbehavioural