What better to way to learn about the effects of certain drugs — such as ecstasy, coccaine, LSD or heroine — on our brains than this cute little flash program?
So what you do is catch a mouse and place the poor guy on the chair, and it will be transported into a microwave-like equipment, and the effects the certain drug has on its brain will be explained. When you’re done, click the EJECT button to return the poor guy into the tank.
The simplified mechanisms of drug action presented here are just a small part of the story. When drugs enter the body they elicit very complex effects in many different regions of the brain. Often they interact with many different types of neurotransmitters and may bind with a variety of receptor types in a variety of different locations. For example, THC in marijuana can bind with cannabinoid receptors located on the presynaptic and/or postsynaptic cell in a synapse.
Where applicable, this presentation primarily depicts how drugs interact with dopamine neurotransmitters because this website focuses on the brain’s reward pathway. Mouse Party is designed to provide a small glimpse into the chemical interactions at the synaptic level that cause the drug user to feel ‘high’.
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It’s cool they thought of this new idea to present the ill-effects of drug abuse on the brain, but I think it’s overly technical.
I for one, couldn’t understand many of the things they were trying to understand. Perhaps more “layman” description would have helped, since I have no idea what Dopamine is … for example.
Good effort, but can be further simplified for the layman like me.
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Yeah, I thought it was overly technical too, but nevertheless, it was fun to be able to learn about science in such a colourful and animated way
If I could find out who designed it, I’d tell them that it is too sophisticated for laymen, OK?
Wow, this flash is nicely done.
But…yeah, it’s just too technical. The terms they use are hard to understand, but I can still grasp what they are trying to say, the basic concept, thanks to the nice animations!
Gosh,I miss cartoons
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Very very interesting.
I visited the site some time ago. It may be tough to understand everything that is being said but the important thing to know is that drugs (and excessive) alcohol is bad.
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A good and educational flash app. I enjoyed myself on how our body reacts to cocaine, alcohol and marijuana which I only know the name of these drugs before I play around with that app.
Thanks for it.
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It is technical but also really cool. I mean, it’s less lame than the “this is your brain on drugs, just say no” isn’t it?
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Awesome! I’m going to check it out in more depth.
It’s too bad that most of you guys found it overly technical. Maybe it needs Wikipedia or a good dictionary standing by? It’s kinda what I do at uni, so I understand it (although I don’t know about any of these drugs specifically. Perhaps your feedback to the genetics group could inspire them to add a terms and defenitions section to the page or something?
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