To Vape or Not to Vape

In February, Dr. Dan McGehee had come to talk about his work on nicotine induced changes on synaptic strength. He specifically focused on the receptor systems that are involved with nicotine, as well as the long term changes that occur because of nicotine in excitatory synaptic input to ventral segmental area dopamine neurons. McGehee discussed that nicotine activates nicotine acetylcholine receptors (nAChR) which then carries on to cause long term potentiation in ventral tegmental area dopamine neurons. This then causes an increase of glutamate through alpha-7 nAChRs on glutamate terminals. Therefore, there is a presynaptic contribution of nicotine in long term potentiation induction. In his study, McGehee and his colleagues had utilized an in vitro exposure paradigm in order to study the effects of nicotine on excitatory synaptic strength in “drug naïve rats” (Mao et al., 2011). This rose the AMPA receptor/NMDAR ratio in ventral tegmental area dopamine neurons, which gave reason to believe there was an induction of long term potentiation caused by the nicotine. They also found that there was an induction of synaptic plasticity which they thought was most likely due to the increased activity of NMDAR. As a result of their research, McGehee and his colleagues had identified receptor systems that have to do with long term changes that are caused by nicotine in excitatory synaptic input to ventral tegmental area dopamine neurons. By identifying these common receptors, addiction to nicotine as well as cigarettes can be better understood.

In a recent New York Times article by Sabrina Tavernise called, “Smokers Urged to Switch to E-Cigarettes by British Medical Group”, the argument of whether e-cigarettes are better than traditional cigarettes for the public health is brought to light. A British medical organization had come up with a report stating that the benefits of e-cigarettes are greater than the cost and that they can help people who smoke to quit. E-cigarettes deliver nicotine to the user, but do this without the use of tar or other chemicals that are found in traditional cigarettes and are what leads to cancer. According to to the director of the U.K. Center for Tabacco and Alcohol Studies at the University of Nottingham, John Britton, e-cigarettes “have the potential to help half or more of all smokers get off cigarettes. That’s a huge benefit, bigger than just about any medical intervention.” However, many experts in the U.S. strongly disagree with this.

According to a professor of medicine at the University of California, “They are turning England into this giant experiment on behalf of the tobacco industry.” Many experts in the U.S. have mentioned many potential dangers of e-cigarettes, such as the fact that they could extend smoking habits, they may be a gateway for traditional cigarettes for children, as well as the fact that since e-cigarettes are a fairly new and fast growing phenomenon, the long term effects of them are unknown. However, there are some in the U.S. who do agree with British experts in that they want policies that will reduce harm to people, not eliminate, such as e-cigarettes rather than traditional, and clean needles for drug use because people are not going to just stop smoking cigarettes or doing drugs and so we should make sure they are doing it in a safer manner. There are some U.S. experts who also say that information that benefits the argument for e-cigarettes has been lost in the midst of the rush to condemn them.

U.K. officials claim that e-cigarettes can increase the ability to quit smoking by 50% and that “long term effects [are] likely to be minimal”, where as U.S. officials claim that they will reduce the chances in quitting. McGehee’s work also contradicts the arguments of British experts in that nicotine does have a long term effect on the body. His work found that nicotine is involved in inducing long term changes in the excitatory synaptic input to ventral tegmental area dopamine neurons. Perhaps a good question to ask is what kinds of effects could this have on the body.

Tavernise mentions in the article that it seems as though the U.K. is focusing more on the hypothetical benefits of e-cigarettes and the U.S. is focusing on the hypothetical risks. The work of McGehee pointed towards identifying more effective treatments for nicotine addiction as well as other psychostimulant addictions. The use of e-cigarettes has grown so fast that the FDA is far behind on regulation on them, hopefully more work like that of McGehee will be done in order to find out if e-cigarettes truly do help with the quitting process and if there are any detrimental long-term effects.

References

Mao, D., Gallagher, K., McGehee, D. “Nicotine Potentiation of Excitatory Inputs to Ventral Tegmental Area Dopamine Neurons.” The Journal of Neuroscience 31. 18 (2011): 6710-6720. Print.

Tavernise, Sabrina. "Smokers Urged to Switch to E-Cigarettes by British Medical Group." The New York Times. The New York Times, 27 Apr. 2016. Web. 01 May 2016. <http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/28/health/e-cigarettes-vaping-quitting-smoking-royal-college-of-physicians.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fscience&action=click&contentCollection=science&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=search&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront>

Picture: http://newsroom.cumc.columbia.edu/blog/2013/11/21/e-cigarettes-healthy-alternative-smoking/