Abstract: Drug addiction is a chronic brain disease characterized by compulsive drug seeking and taking behaviors. From initially go-directed drug use to compulsive drug taking, the drug-seeking behavior in addicts becomes more and more habitual. Compulsive drug seeking and taking behaviors are habitual behaviors depending on dorsolateral striatum, and the impaired function of executive control of behavior by prefrontal cortex-dorsomedial striatum pathway, which leads to persistent control of behavior by sensorimotor cortex-dorsolateral striatum pathway, is an important neural mechanism underlying compulsive addicted behaviors. The study will establish the animal model of drug addiction and adopt behavioral, behavioral pharmacological and morphological techniques to discover the role of the cortex-striatum pathway in compulsive drug seeking and taking behaviors. The results may shed light on the possible molecular mechanisms involved in drug addiction.

Key words: compulsive drug-seeking behavior, dorsolateral striatum, prefrontal cortex, prefrontal-dorsomedial striatum pathway