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Cerebellar Involvement in Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD)

Investigation of Cerebellar Involvement in AUD

Who can join

Ages 25 to 55 · All sexes · Healthy volunteers welcome

Inclusion Criteria:

* completed at least 8 years of education

Exclusion Criteria:

* Estimated Intelligence Quotient (IQ) \< 90
* less than 5th grade reading level
* Left handed
* Non-fluent in English
* current drug use disorder other than alcohol (except nicotine and caffeine) and or recent drug use in the last 90 days
* Positive breath alcohol level at time of MRI scan or discrepancies between alcohol biomarker and self-report that cannot be resolved
* Exhibiting symptoms of alcohol withdrawal on visit 1 assessment
* Significant current psychiatric distress and or treatment
* History of any central nervous system disorder, presence of a seizure disorder, or use of anticonvulsant medication in the past 3 months
* any serious medical condition detected on assessment or by medical record review; or have liver function tests more than three times normal at screening
* History of metal implantation that would preclude MRI scanning; or other implants, pumps, pacemakers that would be contraindications for MRI scanning
* Abnormal MRI scan or history of significant closed head trauma
* Evidence of dementia
* For women, pregnancy

About the study

The goal of this observational and interventional study is to better understand the involvement of the cerebellum in the brain reward system in persons with alcohol use disorder (AUD). The main questions it aims to answer are:

1. What is the nature of cerebellar input to the ventral tegmental area (VTA) in the brain reward system, and how is it perturbed in AUD? 2. What is the relationship between measures of cerebellar integrity and magnitude of reward activation to alcohol-related cues in cerebellar, VTA and other brain reward structures? 3. What is the therapeutic potential of cerebellar transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) for modulating alcohol cue reactivity, associated alcohol craving, and cerebellar - VTA functional connectivity in the brain reward system? Persons with AUD will be compared with healthy control participants.

What is being tested

• cerebellar transcranial direct current stimulation (procedure)

Sponsor: Johns Hopkins University · Participants: 122 · Started: Oct 12, 2023

Contact the study team

• John E Desmond, PhD · Phone: 410-502-3583

Official record on ClinicalTrials.gov — NCT05732207

Locations in the U.S.

Conditions

• Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD)

From ClinicalTrials.gov, data retrieved Oct 2, 2026. Each study sets its own eligibility; the study team decides who can join.