Although ELK1 has not been widely investigated in addiction, other animal studies have shown that acute administration of cocaine (65, 66) or delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (psychoactive component of cannabis)(67) increases pELK1 immediately after drug exposure. Whether these noted differences in pELK1 relate to acute versus chronic drug exposure, type of drugs, cellular localization or other factors in experimental designs of these studies needs to be further explored. However, the fact that ELK1 is altered by several drugs of abuse is intriguing considering the role of ELK1 phosphorylation in neurite outgrowth (62–64) and that dysregulation of structural plasticity is a feature of drugs of abuse.
