{
  "id": 9196054,
  "title": "Cocaine hijacks a brain circuit that naturally supports flexible behavior",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/22/cocaine-hijacks-a-brain-circuit-that-naturally-supports-flexible",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-09-22T20:40:06.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Medical Xpress",
    "slug": "medical-xpress",
    "url": "https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-09-cocaine-hijacks-brain-circuit-naturally.html"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Researchers have discovered a brain circuit that normally supports flexible behavior but can be hijacked by cocaine to drive increasingly rigid and repetitive actions. The findings, published in the journal Current Biology, offer new insights into the mechanisms behind compulsive and stereotyped behavior. Under repeated cocaine exposure, a brain region called the striatum, specifically the ventrolateral striatum (VLS), becomes disproportionately engaged, leading to a narrowing of the range of natural behaviors such as grooming and licking. Using a deep-learning system called STEREO, researchers were able to track changes in an entire behavioral repertoire over time. The study reveals how cocaine can shift the balance between opposing neural pathways, the direct and indirect pathways, within the VLS. Activation of the indirect pathway restores alternative behaviors, while activation of the direct pathway promotes rigidity. This suggests that cocaine does not create a new behavioral program but rather hijacks a brain circuit used for natural actions, pushing behavior toward persistent repetition. The findings may help researchers understand how repetitive motor behaviors emerge in various neurological and psychiatric conditions, and the STEREO system could be a valuable tool for behavioral neuroscience.",
  "summary": "Researchers have identified a brain circuit that normally supports flexible behavior but is recruited by cocaine to drive increasingly rigid and repetitive behavior. Published in the journal Current Biology, the findings show that shifting the balance between opposing neural pathways can either promote behavioral rigidity or, conversely, rapidly interrupt cocaine-driven repetitive behavior and…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}