December 7, 2011
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Everything important in our bodies cycles. Including liver enzymes. Including alcohol dehydrogenase (though DUI laws do not take this into consideration).
This data-set is from an old study (Wilson R, Newman E and Newman H. 1956. Diurnal Variation in Rate of Alcohol Metabolism. J Appl Physiol 8 556-558.), back from the times when it was OK to recruit some college freshmen to drink alcoholic beverages in the name of science (good luck in getting any IRB in the USA to let you do that today!).
This is a record of a diurnal rhythm in alcohol clearance, and the figure is from a pamphlet: Palmer JD 1983. Human Biological Rhythms. Carolina Biological Supply Company, Burlington NC.:
It shows why we can drink more in the evening than at other times of day – there is so much more alcohol dehydrogenase activity in the evening. I am not encouraging drinking here, but if you are into it and can be responsible about it, you can save some serious money by downing a single shot at dawn, according to this graph, or enjoy it more at night.
So, what do you think – does it matter at what time of day/night cops stop you to give you a breathalyzer test? Or your medical tests of various kinds?
And what do you think about the ethics of the study?
a) it was unethical to do this even back in 1956
b) it was OK according to the ethics of the day, but ethics evolves over time so it is unethical today.
c) it is ethical today, but the “ethics creep” of the IRBs has gone way over the line of common sense.
Thoughts?
About the Author: Bora Zivkovic is the Blog Editor at Scientific American, chronobiologist, biology teacher, organizer of ScienceOnline conferences and editor of Open Laboratory anthologies of best science writing on the Web. Follow on Twitter @boraz.
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What’s unethical about determining someone’s alcohol dehydrogenase? Isn’t that just a blood test for a liver enzyme? I wouldn’t think that anyone, except perhaps the experimenter, would need to drink any alcohol for that purpose.
Link to thisAs to determining the pharmico-kinetics of alcohol dehydrogenase level and blood alcohol level, well designed human experiments on consenting subjects, including adolescents, seem entirely appropriate and, given the uniqueness of human physiology, necessary.
The forensic and legal value of any resulting data would be a more complicated and undoubtedly politicized matter.
Americans drink a lot less alcohol than other countries. No, this does not improve the ability of people to tolerate larger amounts of alcohol, and most of those countries have a higher incidence of alcoholism. Standards were certainly less strict in those days.
Okay, that said, in 1956 my mother was still smoking while she was pregnant with me–but she quit before I was six weeks old. No one would have thought for one moment to chide her about that behavior in those days. I have seen old footage of tobacco studies with graduate students being asked to light up, blow smoke into a tube, and then have their vitals measured. Few would abide such callous disregard for human safety today, but no one thought twice about it in 1956.
All this makes me think of the tortuous NAZI human medical experimental testing done during WWII.
Link to this