Role of Non-Coding RNAs in the Neuroadaptation to Alcoholism and Fetal Alcohol Exposure

genetic vulnerability to alcoholism are warranted, and the burgeoning area of microRNAs appears to be a fruitful area of investigation. This is because determining the role of microRNAs in disease will offer both mechanistic and potential therapeutic insight. Gene expression changes after alcohol exposure are well documented. In particular, a vast network of expression changes are found in the brain (and other tissues) following both acute and chronic alcohol exposure. These neuroadaptations are thought to underlie tolerance and dependence on alcohol as well as mediating the toxic effects of alcohol on neurodevelopment. Studies examining the effects of alcohol on microRNA expression are just beginning. Applying this new information on microRNAs to genome-wide studies of gene expression changes after alcohol exposure represents both a significant challenge and tremendous opportunity for unraveling the genetic vulnerability to alcohol dependence. In this special issue of Frontiers in Genetics two important areas relevant to microRNA biology and alcohol are presented. The first article presents recent studies on microRNAs in post-mortem human brain samples from alcoholics compared to non-alcoholics. This is the first study to profile changes in the expression of microRNAs in brain samples from alcoholics. These changes in microRNAs are correlated with previously identified gene expression changes to provide a glimpse into the possible mechanisms by which alcohol neuroadaptation alters the brain. The second article in this special issue examines the effects of fetal alcohol exposure on microRNA expression. This exciting area has important implications for understanding and treating Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders. Collectively, these studies highlight the emerging role of microRNAs in neurobiology in general and alcohol neuroadaptation specifically. Because microRNAs can finetune gene expression in subtle yet critical ways, harnessing these endogenous master regulators holds tremendous promise for the identification of novel drug targets and eventually the development of new therapeutics to treat alcoholism.