Researchers Light Up for Nicotine, the Wonder Drug

[MonkeyMonk]

Researchers Light Up for Nicotine, the Wonder Drug

This is a very interesting read from June 2007

Just a little chunk of text from the article:

..."Nicotine is highly stigmatized -- and for good reason, because the delivery system is so deadly," says Don deBethizy, CEO of Targacept. "But the drug itself and the research generated by studying its effects on the brain both show great promise for helping us improve our physical and mental health." ...

...Now drugs derived from nicotine and the research on nicotine receptors are in clinical trials for everything from helping to heal wounds, to depression, schizophrenia, Alzheimer's, Tourette Syndrome, ADHD, anger management and anxiety. ..
.

[MonkeyMonk]

Another Interesting Read from ScienceDaily (Apr. 4, 2009)
Nicotine May Have More Profound Impact Than Previously Thought

Just a taste of what's in the article:
..."Researchers have found that the alpha-7 receptor, a site known to bind with nicotine, interacts with 55 different proteins. Nicotine may affect bodily processes -- and perhaps the actions of other commonly used drugs -- more broadly than was previously thought. (Credit: Hawrot Lab/Brown University)"...

[MonkeyMonk]

And, a 3rd interesting article from Science A Go Go Nov 2003
Nicotine Improves Memory And Helps Brain Repair Itself
"
The remarkable protective effects of nicotine — the addictive chemical in tobacco — on the brain are continuing to surprise scientists. One recent study has found that one of nicotine's metabolites, cotinine, may improve memory and protect brain cells from diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Another new study shows that nicotine can help improve some of the learning and memory problems associated with hypothyroidism. Such studies suggest that nicotine — or drugs that mimic nicotine — may one day prove beneficial in the treatment of neurological disorders."...

...""We believe that nicotine exposure during development— the same kind of exposure that occurs in mothers who smoke during pregnancy — disrupts normal nicotine receptor activity, much like the knockout mutation, and that this leads to altered emotional learning in adulthood," says King."...


..."Researchers in the laboratories of Karim Alkadhi, PhD, at the University of Houston College of Pharmacy recently studied the effect of nicotine on stress-induced memory impairment in rats. They found that when stressed animals were given nicotine, they performed significantly better at short-term memory tests than stressed animals not given the chemical. In fact, the nicotine-treated stressed animals performed the same as unstressed (control) animals."...

[jamie]

Good info, please add if you find more!

Hope the thread can be moved to the NICOTINE section of the forum.

[ZambucaLu]

Moved to Nicotine.

Lu

[MonkeyMonk]

jamie, yes, I'm glad that Lu moved it. After I posted it in the wrong section, I, too, clicked the triangle to request a moderator move it to the correct section. I was super tired yesterday...

Thanks, Lu!

[Duckies]

This research may give hints about why brain-rewiring drugs like Chantix and Wellbutrin can work beautifully for some and make others positively psychotic.

Thanks for posting the links!

[ED7]

Great info....thank you very much

[OaklandVapors]

My roomie showed me this link, trying to show me that my ecig isn't as harmless as thought:

Nicotine and Cancer

Abstract:
Cigarette smoking is a risk factor for various types of cancer. Nicotine, a major alkaloid in tobacco, is responsible for different aspects in the pathogenesis of smoking-related malignancies. Nicotine only not perpetuates smoking behavior in smokers, which results in further intake of tobacco-derived carcinogens, but also directly increases cellular mutagenic events. Current evidence also supports that nicotine can be metabolized into highly carcinogenic nitrosamines. In addition, nicotine by itself stimulates cancer cell proliferation through multiple mitogenic signaling pathways. Nicotinic stimulation also provides pro-survival signals to cancer cells such that they are more resistant to apoptosis induced by chemotherapeutic agents or ionizing radiation. Moreover, there is evolving evidence suggesting that nicotine can stimulate tumor-associated angiogenesis, a biological process essential for tumor growth and metastasis. It has also been reported that nicotine enhances cancer cell invasiveness and weakens host cancer-killing immunity. Taken together, nicotine seems to play an important role in the initiation, promotion, and progression of smoking-related cancers. A controlled surveillance study on cancer risk of current nicotine users especially those on nicotine replacement therapy is therefore justified.

I can't figure out if they are referring to it by it's self, or in a regular tobacco cigarette...

[katink]

I've placed this piece of 'evidence' into the scare-mongery bin for myself, Oakland (to each his/her own as far as this goes of course!).

Not one single study shows nicotine to cause cancer. Yes, it can make the growing of ALLREADY EXISTING cancer easier. By making the circumstances, the environment in which cancer tries to grow a bit more favourable to the cancer. But saying 'and so nicotine causes cancer' is just scaremongering.
It's about the same as taking the following shortcut: taking a cola each day means intake of sugar. Sugar makes fat. Fat people are more susceptible to heart-attacks.
So: COLA CAUSES HEART-ATTACKS... OH MY... (not!)

It's good to know which factors can attribute to being unhealthy, in whichever way, certainly. But declaring something into a straight-line culprit while it is not, is just misleading, at least in my book.

So just another of the tools the fundamentalists are using to now try to demonize nicotine, for me...

Good finds Monkeymonk, interesting.
I can't help but feel a certain fear though, with all this interest in nicotine - namely that some or other company or institute will try to get to 'own' anything nicotine-like - and will then cut off the possibilities for people to self-medicate, like is happening wide and far with nicotine. BP is bound to look at this all-salivating and trying to find entries to force all those self-medicators to use very expensive (and their, of course...) pills instead.
Guess this is allready happening, with all the anti's that were chasing tobacco now starting to chase nicotine also... and I'm wondering how far this might be steered by BP for this exact reason (being pretty paranoid here, I know... but some parts of society just seem to cause that to surface, wonder why... better go grab some nicotine now )