William Atkins
Saturday, 09 August 2008 22:28
Science -
Health
Page 1 of 3
U.S. researchers finds gene that gives some people a pleasant buzz while others only a nauseating cough after smoking their first cigarette.
American researcher and psychologist
Ovide F. Pomerleau, from the Department of Psychiatry,
Nicotine Research Laboratory, University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), and fellow colleagues—who specialize in statistical genetics, gene analysis, and trait analysis—studied 435 people who either regularly smoke cigarettes or don’t smoke (but have tried cigarettes at some point in their lives).
Specifically, the non-smokers had smoked at least one cigarette during their lives but no more than one hundred—and had never smoked on a regular basis. The smokers currently smoke at least five cigarettes daily and have done so for at least five years.
The results of the study found that the smokers were eight (8) times more likely when compared to the non-smokers to have a “pleasurable buzz” at the time of their first cigarette.
The results, the researchers state, provide an association that helps to explain the either negative reaction (nausa, cough) or position reaction ("buzz," pleasure) to a person’s first cigarette and to the increased likelihood for a person to become addicted to nicotine.
The Pomerleau team found that a variant in the CHRNA5 nicotine receptor gene causes some people to have an increased susceptibility to nicotine addiction, a lifelong habit of smoking, and increased risk of lung cancer and other adverse medical conditions.
Specifically, the smokers were much more likely, when compared to the non-smokers, to have the less common "rs16969968" form of the CHRNA5 (or, cholinergic receptor, nicotinic, alpha 5) human gene.
Page two contains additional information on nicotine addiction.
