Article Critique

Scientific Article Critique

Article: Increased Brain Uptake And Oxidation Of Acetate In Heavy Drinkers (March 2013) Author: Lihong Jiang et al.

Introduction This paper will be critiquing the article published by Jiang et al., titled “Increased Brain Uptake and Oxidation of Acetate in Heavy Drinkers”. The article is published in The Journal of Clinical Investigation Volume 123, Issue 4. As reflected by the title, it accurately and explicitly stated the result of the experiment and managed to capture the attention of the reader. However, for a reader with little or no knowledge of what human brains typically run on, the article’s title might make little sense to them. There are several authors involved in this article with expertise ranging from Diagnostic Radiology, Internal Medicine, Pediatrics and Psychiatry. Their disciplines coincide with the field that the research article was experimenting in, cementing the credentials of the experiment’s results. Before this paper continues further, it is important to state the hypothesis of the abovementioned article as follows: “Upon chronic heavy alcohol intake, brain can use more acetate as a source of energy”. Article’s Literature Review The article started off by stating that alcohol is the most widely used recreational substance and also one of the most abused drugs globally. However, the authors pointed out that the pathogenesis of alcohol use and abuse is not fully understood. Thus, there is a need to fill up this research gap. Traditionally, it is thought that glucose is the only major supply of mitochondrial energy oxidation. As a result, the majority of the literature review was on how acetate can also be used as an alternative energy source for the brain. Prior to this article, there were recent data showing that alcohol decrease brain glucose utilization and increase acetate uptake. These findings thereby lead to the article’s hypothesis. The literature review definitely equips a reader with the...