Drinking more than one glass of wine a night is enough to kill cells in key regions of a woman's brain. A study on mice found that drinking alcohol is damaging to the subventricular region of the brain, where new brain cells are created to sustain brain function, and protect against tumors and neurodegenerative diseases.
Research showed that female brains displayed more severe deficits after drinking than males, who would need more than 14 drinks a week to suffer significant damage. Prolonged alcohol abuse can cause severe brain damage and neurodegeneration. The number of nerve cells in the adult brain was fixed early in life and the best way to treat alcohol-induced brain damage was to protect the remaining nerve cells.
Research has shown that adult brains produce stem cells that create new nerve cells and alcohol is suppressing that process. Researchers used a technique that allowed them to tag brain stem cells and observe how they migrate and develop into nerve cells over time. This allowed them to study the impact of long-term alcohol consumption on the cells.
The female brains displayed more severe intoxication behaviors and greatly reduced the pool of stem cells in the subventricular zone, where the new cells are generated. The findings show that the effects of repeated alcohol consumption differed across brain regions. And the region most susceptible to the effects of alcohol was one of two brain regions where new cells are created in adults.
Drinking a glass of wine, or five ounces with a 12 percent alcohol content, can lower one's risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, research found. But the report does warn that heavy drinking increases the risk of mortality and the development life-threatening illnesses.
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