I wonder what defines alcohol tolerance in the biological level. Like because of this part or trait, I can drink x amount of bottles compared to the other guy that can only drink y amount od bottles.
Its said that you can develop alcohol tolerance, so I wonder which parts of the body change to reflect that.
The only trait that I know of currently is the size of the body since technically given the same amount of alcohol, a smaller body will be filled up more compared to a larger body.
In: Biology
I am a 135 lb dude. I no longer drink, but went from having very little tolerance (a beer would get me buzzed) to working in a bar, drinking every day, and having a much higher tolerance. I gained no weight. It for sure has to do with whatever organs process alcohol. When they are forced to do it alot, they build up whatever enzymes or hormones do that. And if they dont have to break down alcohol that often, prune back whatever processes that were being used before.
Smooth Endoplasmic Reticulum in liver cells processes alcohol.
Studies (via biopsy) show that smooth ER increases as one’s drinking habit (and tolerance) increase.
Hi!
There are so many issues.
* Blood volume – A typical adult has a blood volume of approximately 5 liters, with females and males having approximately the same blood percentage by weight (approx 7 to 8%) so a 100 kg (220 lb) guy has 7-8 kg of blood. (1 Kg is approx 1 l for fluids based mostly on water.) A 50 kg person (110 lb) would have half that blood volume.
When they calculate blood alcohol content (BAC) our legal limit is 0.08. For a BAC of 0.10 (0.10% or one tenth of one percent) means that there is 1.0 g (.001 of a kg) of alcohol for every 1 L of blood.
* Genetics – some people groups are lacking the enzyme [Alcohol dehydrogenase](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_dehydrogenase) which is part of the pathway for breaking down alcohol. These people do not process alcohol as quickly. These people need a longer time to process alcohol to get sober. This is specifically the ADH1B gene
* Gender – Women are generally more sensitive to alcohol
* Age – older people have slower metabolic rates, and lower “total body water”
* liver, kidney, pancreas function
Types of tolerance:
Behavioral— if you drink alcohol often, you get used to its effects/the way it makes you feel, think, act, so you can manage to “appear” more sober than someone who is drinking for the first time
Metabolic— your body gets better at metabolizing alcohol. For example, blood tests can identify if you drink a lot of alcohol by detecting elevations in certain liver enzymes. If you drink a lot, your body will produce more of these enzymes so that you can eliminate alcohol more quickly from your body
Cellular/synaptic— your body and brain always prefers to be at rest/balance/homeostasis, and will try to get back to resting state by compensating for being “pushed” away from rest in one direction or the other. For example if you get too hot, your body tries to get back to resting/normal temp by producing sweat to try to cool you down.
In the case of alcohol tolerance: Alcohol activates GABA receptors on your brain cells, which typically turns the cell “off.” If you activate enough of these receptors you will get really tired and pass out, basically because you’ve turned off so many cells.
Remember, there is a baseline “resting” amount of gaba receptor activation happening all the time—
if you drink a lot, you will be constantly activating these receptors and turning off cells more than normal, and the cell will try to compensate by making less receptors available for alcohol to interact with. So next time you drink you will have to drink more alcohol to turn off as many cells as you did last time because the amount of available GABA receptors has decreased, making it harder for alcohol to find them and turn off the cell.
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