Posted by metafunj on November 3, 2009, at 14:43:59
In reply to Re: Which Drug increase dopamine the most? » metafunj, posted by delna on November 3, 2009, at 3:45:40
Thats a good question since it can be hard to tell. Dopamine should increase positive mood and can cause eurphoria. Too much would increase paranoia. It also increase your ability to focus on one thing. The biggest difference is that it can make you obsessive about one thing and it increases your desire for pleasurable experiences such as sex and drugs. It increases libido.
Norepinephrine seems to raise blood pressure and can cause tinnitus as well as induce seizures. Norepinephrine decrease libido in males because Norepinephrine is released after orgasm and causes the penis to go flaccid. So just imagine having that chemical elevated all the time. Norepinephrine promotes wakefulness and energy as well.
I believe many of the positive effects of norepinephrine reuptake inhibition come from the fact that the Norepinephrine neurons in the prefrontal cortex take up Dopamine as well and metabolize it into norepinephrine. If you block this transporter on the norepinephrine neuron it allows more dopamine to circulate.
There seems to be a lot of overlap with the effects of Dopamine and Norepinephrine, but the main difference seems to be that dopamine should increase pleasure and mood while norepinephrine increases energy. Another reason it could be hard to perceive the difference is because Dopamine is metabolized into Norepinephrine, and then into epinephrine(adrenaline).
poster:metafunj
thread:924176
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/neuro/20090701/msgs/924300.html