MRS can be used in animals to detect and quantify in vivo and real-time brain EtOH kinetics (e.g., rats: Sullivan et al. 2005c; monkeys: Kaufman et al. 1994). Unlike findings in long-term sober human alcoholics, nonabstinent chronic heavy drinkers (Meyerhoff et al. 2004) and social and moderate drinkers (Ende et al. 2006) show elevated levels of brain Cho. Elevated levels of Cho are also reported in the thalamus of rodents between weeks 16 and 40 of alcohol exposure (Lee et al. 2003). Neuroimaging research has been conducted with rodent models of binge (Zahr et al. 2010, 2013, 2014b), repeated binge (Zahr et al. 2015), and chronic alcohol exposure (Zahr et al. 2009). In vivo MRS studies have consistently shown that a single 4-day binge exposure with BALs approaching 300 mg/dL is associated with reversible changes to the brain: levels of NAA are lower and those of Cho are higher following binge EtOH exposure (Zahr et al. 2010, 2013, 2014b). In the repeated-binge experiment, animals were exposed to 5 cycles of 4 days of intragastric EtOH treatment and 10 days of
